Getting Out Alive
by mother-zombie
Summary: Uncle Grandpa gathers up 21 of his friends and puts them all in an Amusement Park he built in an effort to have them all get along with each other. Unfortunately for everyone, an evil rat named Tanezumi takes over the Amusement Park and turns the "getting along" premise into a survival game where they must kill each other in order to leave the Amusement Park.
1. Chapter 1

I was lying in bed and watching a report on the news about a new virus that had been going around. The news reporter said it was nothing life threatening, however, and there was research still being done about it. They warned us all to be careful. After watching the news I fell asleep, and that's all I could remember.  
When I woke up I found myself slumped over a rock on what looked like a beach. I immediately panicked because I had no idea what was going on. "Where am I?" I shouted in surprise as I bolted up. I looked around frantically, seeing nothing but water and palm trees. "Oh my gosh!" I slapped my hands against my face before screaming. I suddenly heard a voice and that made me jump back and fall over.

"GOOD MORNING!" I heard the voice shout cheerfully. I let out a high-pitched noise as I scooted myself back as fast as I could, not processing whoever the figure was standing in front of me. "Did I surprise you, Mary?" the person asked. _How did they know my name?_ I blinked a few times and shook my head to help me process what exactly was going on. My eyes widened when I saw them. The handlebar mustache, the big pink nose, the blue propeller hat, I could recognize that anywhere! "Uncle Grandpa!" I called out excitedly with a big grin on my face. I remember when he helped me obtain my Driver's License. What a crazy experience that was, but I will always be thankful for his kindness and patience with me. "Good Morning, Mary!" he greeted me with a friendly wave. "Now, what I want to know is, what are you doing all the way over here?" he asked me as he tilted his head to the side. "Uhh, well I-" I began to speak as I propped myself with my elbows. "I-I'm not really sure where I am myself" I admitted. Uncle Grandpa smiled and let out a hearty chuckle. "Don't you worry," he offered his hand to me. "when we get back to where the others are, this will all be explained in no time!" I grabbed his hand and let him help me up. I brushed the sand off of myself before following him down a rainbow colored path in the forest of palm trees. _What a strange set up_ I thought to myself as I observed my surroundings. Shortly down the trail, there was a large building with a statue of Uncle Grandpa in front of it. The building looked a bit like a hotel. _What is a hotel doing here?_ my thoughts were racing with questions and the more I looked around the more confused I became. When we walked through the rotating door that marked the entrance of the building, I saw before me a relatively large group of people. They were all standing around waiting. "Finally!" one of them said in frustration. "Calm down, Dennis" Uncle Grandpa waved his finger. Whoever spoke must have been named Dennis. Uncle Grandpa turned to me. "Go ahead and join the others" he told me, and I nodded and did as he said. "Uncle G, are you gonna tell us why we're here now?" one of the people in the group said. I quickly glanced to see where the voice was coming from, and noticed a boy with sandy brown hair and sunglasses leaning up against the hotel's counter. Actually, from that quick glance I noticed a lot of strange people. One of the people next to him had blue hair and the person in front of her had an oddly shaped large nose. The person with the large nose stood next to a boy with pink hair and a zipper for a mouth. What is going on? I turned my gaze back to Uncle Grandpa who cleared his throat. "Okay, I know you are all wondering why you are here" he started. "But first, I would like to say... GOOD MORNING!"

I heard frustrated sighs all around me. "GET ON WITH IT ALREADY!" one of the people shouted angrily. I believe that was Dennis again, it sounded like the first person I heard speak. "Alright, alright" Uncle Grandpa sighed as he did a little tap dance spin. When he stopped this little dance, he began to speak again. "I brought each and every one of you here because I care deeply about all of you and I want all of you to get along!" he had a hopeful smile and what looked like tears in his eyes. Everyone let out a bunch of frustrated sighs again. "This is preposterous! I was taken from my beautiful internet for this?" a nasally voice piped up from the crowd. "That doesn't make any sense" a deep, raspy voice pointed out. "We already get along just fine, I don't understand what you are getting at."

"I agree" a light voice with a slight Asian accent spoke. "Well, you humans do hate us for some reason, perhaps this is for Disgustoid tolerance reasons" a light, proper sounding voice suggested. _Disgustoid?_ What's that? "I am NOT getting along with any DISGUSTOIDS" the nasally voice screeched. "WE DON'T WANT TO GET ALONG WITH YOU EITHER YOU FAT ACNE FILLED HUMAN WORM!" a crazed female voice hissed. "HEY DON'T YOU TALK TO MY SON LIKE THAT!" a loud and deep voice shouted. "I'M NOT YOUR SON!" the nasally voice corrected the previous statement. Everyone began to argue and Uncle Grandpa began to tug on his handlebar mustache. He then took in a deep breath. "ENOUGH!" he shouted over all the arguing. Everyone fell silent. "THAT is what I'm talking about!" Uncle Grandpa pointed out sternly as he waved his finger at us. "Alright, how about to start things off we sit in a circle around this carpet over here and play a little break the ice game?" he suggested. "THIS ISN'T KUMBAYA TIME!" an angry boy shouted as he stepped out from the crowd. He had messy dark brown hair and a blue sweater. "That is IT! I am so done with this I am leaving!" he marched toward the door. "NO!" Uncle Grandpa shouted and blocked the door. "You can't go! Please sit down, Dennis!" the old man begged him. "No! I am tired of your shenanigans!" Dennis clenched his fists. "Dennis, let's just go with it" a strange sounding voice said. I turned to look and saw the boy with pink hair and a zipper for a mouth. "Let's all listen to Uncle Grandpa and form a circle. I'm sure this is for everyone's good! He wouldn't be doing all of this if it weren't." Dennis had an irritated pout on his face as he glared at the strange boy. He continued to glare for a few moments before finally speaking. "FINE! But I just want you to know that I do not like this one bit!" He grumpily sat down on the carpet. Everyone else followed and formed a circle. I sat next to a girl with dark brown hair and a black beret and a girl with red hair in braids. "Alright, here is the deal, there's a lot of you so we need to go through this pretty quickly" he told us. "You can talk more to each other later, but as long as you know everyone's names now it'll be easier to chat with everyone later! That's going to be important because the more you get along with everyone, the more stickers you will earn! If you get enough stickers, you will be able to leave this place and go about your normal lives again!" he explained to us before pointing at Dennis who was grumpily sitting next to him.

"Go ahead" he told him. "Dennis! My name is Dennis, now wh-" before he could finish his sentence Uncle Grandpa pointed to the blue person sitting next to them. "Blegh blugh blegh" the blue person babbled. The purple person sitting next to them began to speak. "His name is Dingle, and my name is Festro!" next to the purple person was a man with a butt-shaped chin. "They call me The Fart" his voice was rather proper for such a silly name. "I'm Tiger!" a petite Asian girl with a trendy outfit said as she waved to all of us. "Mr. Gus is my name" a dark-skinned man with green hair sitting next to her said. "Billy Baggins!" the zipper-mouthed boy told us. "The all-famous Pizza Steve! I'm sure you have all heard of me!" The sandy haired boy with sunglasses told us. He sure was full of himself, because I haven't heard of him at all. "Ramonaaaa Desdemonaaa~" the blue haired monster-looking girl next to him chirped in a sing songy voice. "Slog!" the guy with the large nose said. "Gweelok is the name!" a fat, lime-skinned boy with a severe case of acne told us. "Ham Sandwich!" a fat nasally-voiced boy with severe acne pushed up his glasses as he spoke. "Ugh, Remo" a boy with blonde hair and sunglasses huffed. "Melvin!" a tall boy with blonde hair spoke triumphantly. "Guillermo!" a dark haired boy with a Spanish accent chirped happily. "Eric, but you can call me Cupcake!" a dark-skinned boy with a hat told us as he nodded his head. "F-" a guy with deep red-orange hair began to speak, but a short, chubby guy spoke for him. "That's Hot Dog Person!" he told us. "Well, my real name is Frank Herbert" the guy with deep red-orange hair told us in a deep, gloomy voice as he looked away timidly. "I'm Beary Nice! THAT'S ME!" the chubby guy told us in an annoyingly happy voice. "My name is Susie" the girl with braids sitting next to me spoke up. Uncle Grandpa then pointed to me. "Oh uh..." I blushed and looked away from everyone. "I'm Mary!". He then pointed to the dark haired girl next to me. "My name is Isabella, but you all better call me Izzie if you know what's good for you!" she shook her fist angrily. "I like this girl" Dennis pointed to her and chuckled.

"Alright! Now that you all know about each other, how about you go outside and explore the place around you!" he instructed us. We all got up and started outside. When we all got outside, we saw the bright sunny sky turn cloudy and dark. Suddenly, a bolt of lighting crashed down onto the statue of Uncle Grandpa. We all gasped as it's head was knocked clean off. "Oh no!" Uncle Grandpa gasped. We heard a villainous cackle before another strike of lightning came down.


	2. Chapter 2

When the second bolt of lightning crashed down, the decapitated Uncle Grandpa statue was now completely knocked over. In its place stood a large statue of a rodent looking creature with evil looking eyes. It stood in a triumphant manner, and was standing on what looked like a panicked statue of Uncle Grandpa. Everyone was wide-eyed and silent as we all looked up at the statue. There was something quite unnerving about it. We heard another villainous cackle before a bolt of lightning crashed down in front of us. We all shouted in surprise as we jumped back. When the lightning bolt disappeared, the rat depicted in the statue was standing before us. It had pink fur with patches of black, glowing red eyes, and a strange pink glowing aura around it. "That's enough fun and games, everyone!" the rat spoke. Susie screamed and nearly fainted. I caught her as she was falling and helped her back to her feet. "What is that thing and what's it doing here?!" Ham Sandwich boomed in a worried tone. "The real question is why you're REALLY here" the rat spoke, it's voice was ethereal yet ominous at the same time. "Yeah, what the heck is going on?" Dennis asked in his usual frustrated voice. He really wanted to make sense of the situation, but I doubted that any of this was real. All of this chaos was too crazy to be really happening. I began to believe I was having a bad nightmare. I hope I was going to wake up soon.

"Uncle Grandpa gathered you all here to buddy around with each other..." the rat started and leaned in close to us. The storm seemed to quiet down as the rat leaned in. "because he erased part of your memories!" when the rat said that, everyone gasped and began to look at each other. "That's not true!" Uncle Grandpa shouted in a high pitched voice. "That rat is a liar!" Uncle Grandpa pointed angrily at the rat. "If I'm such a liar, can you all tell me how you got here?" the rat asked us. "Well we walked from the beach to the building!" Slog stated matter-of-factly. Billy shook his head and placed his hand on his shoulder. "Slog, the rat means how we first came to this place in general not how we got to the building" he corrected him. "Oh! Well in that case, I have no idea!" Slog hung his head in disappointment. Everyone else shook their heads, at a loss for an answer. "All I remember is waking up on a beach" Frank told us in his glum voice. I was surprised when he said that. Everyone had a similar experience to what I had. _This is too unreal!_ "Just as I thought. That's because he erased your memories! What a jerk move!" the rat laughed. Everyone was silent and watching Uncle Grandpa, who was nervously shifting his eyeballs. "I, uh... uhh" he wiped sweat off his forehead. "Uncle Grandpa, why?" Billy Baggins asked with a forlorn voice as he looked up at him with teary eyes. "I-I..." Uncle Grandpa stuttered, becoming teary eyed as well. "No matter," the rat piped in. "We're gonna take this kumbaya bullshit and slam dunk it in the trash! How boring is that? Making friends to get out of here, more like bullshit to me!" The pink rodent started to cackle. "Before I tell you the NEW rules, how about I introduce myself..." the creepy creature crawled up onto the platform the new statue was standing on.

"My name is Tanezumi!" the pink rat danced as it spoke its name. "I will be overseeing this new Amusement Park of Blood Baths and Death!" Everyone gasped. "D-Death?!" Susie gulped as the word spilled from her lips. "No way! You can't do that to the Amusement Park of Playfulness and Happiness and Uncle Grandpa-i-ness" Uncle Grandpa stomped his foot down. "Of course I can! Your amusement park's name was dumb anyways!" Tanezumi brushed him off. "It's not dumb!" the old man whined. "Now, let's go over the rules, shall we?" Tanezumi took a scroll from Uncle Grandpa's back pocket. "Hey! That was mine!" Uncle Grandpa exclaimed in a whiny voice. "Does it look like I care?" the rat looked at him with a sarcastic face. Then the rodent opened up the scroll and laughed. "Oh no no, this just will not do!" the rat giggled as it took out a pen and began to scratch it off. "In order to get out of here, you're not going to become best friends with anyone," Tanezumi scribbled on the scroll before looking up at us. "In order to get out of here, you must kill until you are the last one standing!"

When Tanezumi uttered that statement, everyone's faces went pale as gasps filled the air. "You want us to kill each other?" Pizza Steve lowered his shades to reveal his widened eyes as he asked. He then put his sunglasses back on and crossed his arms. "T-That's crazy! There's no way we're going to do that!" he told Tanezumi as he waved one of his hands like as if he was swatting something away. "If you don't, you'll never leave!" the rat laughed. "Anyways, let's look at the other rules..."

Before anything else was said, Slog raised his hand like as if he were in school. Tanezumi looked up and nodded in his general direction to signify he can speak. "Uhh... are you a girl or a boy?" Slog asked as he tapped his fingers together. Billy put his hand against his own forehead when Slog asked. "That is quite rude of you!" Tanezumi told him, a bit of anger in the ominous voice. "I am obviously a female. How is that not obvious to you all." She brushed a hand through her fur and looked back at the scroll. "Huh... next rule is have fun and don't hurt each other?" she looked down at the scroll before bursting into a fit of laughter. "You aren't very organized, are you Gramps?" she took her pen and scribbled out the rule. "HEY! It took me 2 days to finish that scroll!" Uncle Grandpa told her sternly as he waved his finger. "Tanezumi, you are not very nice!" he scolded her. "I never was known for my kindness" she told him as she began to write on the scroll. After a few minutes of writing, she held up the scroll to begin reading it. She cleared her throat and was about to speak, when suddenly Remo stepped up from the crowd and stood close to the statue. "No, no, no, and no!" he began to groan. "This is RIDICULOUS! I want to go HOME! This is so not cool! This is lame!" he stamped his foot on the ground in frustration. "Go stand over there and shut up, kid!" Tanezumi ordered as she waved her hand at him like as if she were shooing away a fly. "Don't you tell me what to do you-" Remo lunged forward and the next thing I knew a spear came out of the statue and into Remo's head. Everyone let out a scream as his chubby body flopped over. Everyone fell silent as they watched Remo's crimson blood form a pool below his spear-pierced head. "Y-You killed him!" I shook in fear as tears welled up in my eyes. _This isn't happening! None of this is real! It's all a bad dream! Everything is fine! No one is dead!_

"That brings us to rule number two, do NOT try to harm Tanezumi in any way, or else you will meet a demise similar to Remo over here." she told us sternly before giggling and smiling. "Look at that! You have one less person to worry about on your way out of this park! You also know exactly what will happen to you if you break any of my rules!"

Dennis let out an enraged cry and stamped his foot. "What is this talk of an amusement park? Explain to me, now, what is going on?!" he demanded an explanation as he clenched his teeth and fists. "I'll let you explore soon enough, for now we will finish going over the rules" she looked at her scroll. "All rides and attractions shut down at 11 pm and start back up at 9 am, that is the third rule. The fourth rule is that you cannot climb, dig under, or damage any gates or barricades that bar you from entering a certain part of the park, nor can you climb, dig under, or damage any of the border gates surrounding the park." she continued to read the scroll. "The last rule is to not damage any of the surveillance equipment I have installed around the park," when she informed us of that rule, a surveillance camera and a relatively small flat screen TV popped out of the wall of the Hotel Building. "I will add more rules as we go along. Any questions?" she looked up from her scroll. "Yeah, why do you want us to kill each other?" Dennis interrogated the park overseer. "That's not important" she brushed off his question in that ominous voice of hers as she waved at us. "You can all go explore now, ta-ta for now!" she cackled and seemed to disappear from thin air.

"Okay, this IS NOT happening!" I shouted my thoughts out loud. "Mary, I feel your pain, but unfortunately, this IS happening." Billy informed me, much to my dismay. "I-I'm scared!" Frank stammered. "Me too!" Susie agreed, trembling as she looked around. "No one is killing anyone!" Uncle Grandpa barged into the conversation as he held his hands out at his sides. "You will not hurt each other! Do not listen to that dirty, mean rat!" Everyone just looked at him glumly. "Well, Uncle G, if you won't stand by us killing each other, how's about you let us out of here!" Pizza Steve suggested in a miffed tone. "Sure thing, guys!" Uncle Grandpa reached into his pocket and pulled out a remote. "I'll just push this button and-" he pressed the button and waited a moment. "Hmm... I'll just press the button and-" he pressed it again and waited a moment. He began to press the button several times. Each time he pressed it, however, nothing seemed to happen. "Oh no! It's not working!" Uncle Grandpa panicked. Then he remembered something and shouted "WAIT A GOSH DARN MINUTE!"

He placed his fingers up against his temples. "I'll just take us back in time! That way none of this could have happened!" he closed his eyes and seemed to concentrate really hard, but nothing seemed to be happening. He opened his eyes. "There we go all be-" before he finished his sentence he looked around. "Hey, everything is still the same!" he sighed. "Why won't my time traveling powers work?" He shut his eyes tightly and gritted his teeth. "Hang on, Uncle Grandpa, perhaps we can weave through dimensional portals to get out of here" Billy suggested. He began to stick his hand into his own mouth, but ended up getting into a coughing fit as he rapidly took it out. "W-what? Usually my hand can grab onto other dimensions!" Billy looked confused. "This is ridiculous! Time travel, dimension hopping, that's not real!" Dennis shouted angrily at them. "Of course it is! Remember when we traveled to Egypt together? We had to travel through a dimension-hopping sarcophagus!" Uncle Grandpa reminded him. "I don't know what the heck that was but it certainly wasn't dimension hopping madness!" Dennis began to tug on his hair. "I'm sure we can find an answer on the internet" Gweelok suggested as he went to reach in his bag. His eyes widened as he felt around in the bag. "W-Where's my laptop?" Gweelok began to panic. "Oh, I took it and hid it with the rest of the cell phones and computers because I wanted you all to get along without any kind of internet or other silly things!" Uncle Grandpa smiled. "Cool idea, huh?" Gweelok put his hands on his head and tugged his short black hair. "WHAT?! NO! THAT WAS NOT A COOL IDEA THAT WAS A HORRIBLE IDEA!" Gweelok shouted. "I can't even play video games to cope with the situation now!" Ham Sandwich complained in his nasally voice.

"Guys, let's all remain calm!" Mr. Gus piped in as he held his hand out. "We're not going to be able to figure anything out if we panic like this. Panic and chaos is most likely what Tanezumi wants from us!" It was nice to hear a voice of reason, but I still couldn't believe everything that was happening. "Yeah, Mr. Gus is right," Pizza Steve agreed. "We should check out what this place is all about and what we do and don't have access to!" Mr. Gus smiled. "That's the most intelligent thing I have ever heard you say, Steve." Pizza Steve tipped his sunglasses and rolled his eyes in response. "Anyways, once we figure out what we have access to and understand how this place works a bit, we can assess what we all can do to get out of here safely without killing anyone" Mr. Gus's reasonable plan was agreed upon by everyone. "Alright, let's split up and take a look around, and then meet back in the Hotel Lobby at 6 pm!" Mr. Gus instructed us before walking off to go explore. Everyone else went their ways to look around at the amusement park. I looked around at the directions I could take, and decided to go back into the hotel. If I was going to be forced to live here, I want to make sure I have a comfortable and safe place to sleep in.

I went through the doors and traveled up the stair case. I noticed when I got up to the first floor, the stairs leading to the second staircase was locked up by a gate. This must have been what Tanezumi was talking about earlier. I continued to observe the gate a bit before making my way down the hall. There, I found a line up of 23 rooms, each door had one profile picture of every person that was brought to this amusement park, including Uncle Grandpa himself. In fact, it looked like he had the most deluxe room at the end of the hall. At least it looked that way, it looked like it would have more space than our rooms. On the ceiling in the middle of the hall, there was a surveillance camera. Seeing it made me shudder. I decided to ignore it for now and looked around to find my picture. As I looked at the pictures, I noticed Remo's picture had a big red X on it. It grimly reminded me of what I saw not only 10 minutes ago. _Poor Remo, he didn't need to die like that._ As I stepped up to my room, I noticed the door knob had some kind of fingerprint scanner on it. Before I could further observe it, Tanezumi appeared next to me.

"Cool system, eh?" I jumped and let out a surprised shriek. "T-Tanezumi?" I stuttered out. "These locks are unique because they will only open for your fingerprint, no one else's." she told me. "If you want us to kill each other, why install locks on the doors?" I asked her. "Well, I'm a reasonable woman! Not everything can be fun and killing all the time! Sometimes you need a little beauty sleep and time to freshen up, and these locks will help you do that!" she explained to me. "Well, that is thoughtful of you..." I told her. "Remo's room is completely unlocked, though, because he is dead so it doesn't matter if you sneak in there in the middle of the night" she told me. "I wouldn't want to do that" I responded. "I'm just saying!" Tanezumi seemed annoyed by my answer. "Anyways, I just figured I'd tell you about the fingerprint system. Go ahead and try it out!" she instructed me before disappearing again. Once Tanezumi was gone, I put my finger up against the finger pad. As Tanezumi told me, the door unlocked and I was able to enter. The room before me was beautiful! It had a big, comfy bed, a night stand, a little table with chairs, and a bathroom with a shower in it. I proceeded in to enjoy my new room when suddenly I saw it. _**The surveillance camera and the TV.**_ "Ugh" I groaned. Tanezumi is insane! I no longer wanted to stay in that room, but what could I do? It was just creepy to know Tanezumi was watching us even when we sleep! I exited the room and made sure to shut the door. There I saw Izzie with the same disgusted look I had when I saw the surveillance cameras. "How's a girl supposed to get her privacy with those cameras?" she hissed. "I hear ya, it feels so weird being watched!" I replied. "It sucks because there's no way in hell I'm going to make adult movies with Frank for Tanezumi to watch." Hearing her say that brought a look of disgust and shock to my face. "H-How can you be thinking about that right now?!" She just laughed at my reaction. "What? I'm sure you were thinking about that too when you saw the surveillance camera!" I shook my head, dumbfounded by her logic.

"You're boring!" Izzie told me before huffing and leaving. _Poor Frank, but I guess he's safe for now._ I shook my head and headed down the stairs. There I saw Dingle and Festro at the foos ball table I haven't noticed until now. "Blegh blugh blegh blegh!" Dingle chirped happily as he rapidly turned the knobs. Festro was laughing and turning the knobs on his side of the table. "No, Dingle, I'm gonna beat you! Hahaha!"

They seemed to be having a pretty heated game. I wonder why they weren't taking this time to explore the island. I guess I can't really worry about that right now. I exited the hotel building and began down the rainbow path Uncle Grandpa lead me through earlier. It lead me straight to the beach I woke up on. I saw Susie, Melvin, Guillermo, and Eric when I got there. "Hi Mary!" Guillermo greeted me with a friendly wave. I greeted him back as I approached them. "Did you find anything here?" I asked them. "Well, it seems this beach is fake," Eric informed me. "Take a look at this rock!" He then proceeded to lift the big rock I was asleep on early and turned it upside down. He then pointed to a place on the rock. "It says 'Made in China'!" I went over and read the little imprinted words. "Huh," I knocked on the rock, and found it was hollow. "That is something!"

"The water doesn't even go out as far as what it looks like!" Melvin told me. "Look at this!" He picked up a flat "fake" rock on the ground and skipped it over the water. It skipped a bit before it seemed to hit something and made a metal clink noise. The rock immediately went into the water. "It's painted like a view of the ocean, but it's really a barricade!" I said as I observed the realistic mural of the ocean. "Whoever painted that is a really good artist!" Susie complimented. "Like Michaelangelo!" Guillermo professed. "Besides the point, we're not going to be able to swim or raft our way out of here" Melvin sighed. "If we keep looking I'm sure we'll find an answer" Eric remained hopeful. "I hope so." I sighed. "Well I'm going to go see what else this place has, I will catch up with you guys later." I told them. I began on my way back down the rainbow colored path. As I reached the hotel courtyard, I heard a scream coming from the area over the bridge. I gasped and took off running. "OH MY GOD!"


	3. Chapter 3

I rushed over the bridge as fast as I could. I barely paid attention to any of my other surroundings and headed straight for where the noise was coming from. "OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD!" the voice screeched. It sounded like Ham Sandwich's nasally voice. I burst through the doors of the small building it was coming from and saw Ham Sandwich and Gweelok standing with their backs turned to me. They seemed to have their palms against their cheeks. I walked around so I could see their faces, and rather than seeing a look of horror like I expected, I saw two elated faces. "THIS IS HEAVEN!" Ham Sandwich exclaimed in a high-pitched tone. "YOU CAN SAY THAT AGAIN!" Gweelok agreed. I turned to look at what they were fawning over, and it turns out it was a whole arcade of games. Indeed it was a wonderful game room, with many classic arcade games like Pac-Man, Street Fighter, and Mortal Kombat. It also had first person shooter games, ski ball, a basketball machine, some win-a-prize games, and air hockey. "Woah!" I thought out loud as I looked around. "This looks like alot of fun," I smiled and turned to look at Ham Sandwich and Gweelok. They both shot looks at me. "These games belong to us!" Ham Sandwich crossed his arms as he shook his head at me. "Yeah! We're the video game nerds here! Buzz off!" Gweelok responded, also crossing his arms. Standing together, they almost looked like twins. "I-I'm sorry" I apologized. "I'll leave you two alone then" I told them as I exited the arcade. _At least no one was hurt._

I walked out of the arcade and immediately began to look around the area I had passed without observing. Upon looking around, I found out why this place was called an amusement park. There were a few carnival rides, the arcade I had just exited, a gift shop, a cafeteria, a few game stands, and an information booth. Also off in the distance, there was a gate with a huge lock on it. There's nothing I can do about that though, as the rules state I'm not allowed to tamper with any of the locks. I went up to the information booth, hoping I could find some answers about this place. I went up to the counter and rang the bell that sat by the edge of the counter. Just as I rung the bell, Uncle Grandpa sprouted up from behind the booth. "GOOD MORNING!" he shouted cheerfully. The sudden greeting made me shout and fall over. "Geez Louise, Mary, you are easy to surprise!" he giggled. "Well, I'll be honest with you Uncle Grandpa, I was not expecting a greeting like that." I admitted as I got up and brushed myself off.

"You rang?" he asked, seemingly ignoring my answer. "Uh, yes. I rang because I was hoping to know more about this amusement park here." I answered him, not expecting him to tell me anything of importance. "Well, this amusement park was made solely for you guys! The purpose was to help you all get along. Unfortunately, Tanezumi took over the park and is completely making the worst out of this fun amusement park." he told me in a dramatic manner. I felt like I was watching one of those soap-operas you find on TV when you flip through the channels. "Uh, yeah I know all about that already, is there any other information I should know about this place? Like when it was built or something?" I asked trying to gather any kind of information, even if it didn't seem too relevant right now. "Well I, with the help of my friend Frankenstein and a few of his buddies, built this amusement park in an unknown year!" he stated in such a scholarly manner that the nonsensical answer almost sounded plausible. "How could you not remember when you built it?" I raised one of my eyebrows. "Usually I time travel so much I forget what year it is!" he sighed. "Though, everything in this park looks relatively new and untouched, so perhaps you have made this recently?" I asked. "Perhaps." Uncle Grandpa rubbed his chin. "The food here is delicious! I ordered the finest of chefs to cook the food!" he told me with much excitement in his voice. "I bet you can't wait to eat dinner, huh?"

"I'm looking forward to it." I told him. "Anyways, can you please tell me why you erased part of our memories? Do you even know who Tanezumi is?" The questions I asked seemed to make Uncle Grandpa uncomfortable. "Mary, I told you I can't tell you that! I wish I could but I'm not allowed to! I-I don't want to see you get hurt!" he told me with tears in his eyes. "You all mean so much to me I don't know what I'd do if any of you got hurt!" he shut his eyes and took in a deep breath. "It's bad enough I lost Remo, I can't lose any of you!" He sobbed before opening them again. "As for Tanezumi, I haven't met her in my life! I don't know what she'd have against me or any of you! She's a very mean rodent!" he told me with a stern look on his face. I think he answered everything he had the capability of answering for now. There's no sense of me badgering him about what went on earlier or what happened to our memories, as it made him pretty upset. I don't know about the others, but seeing Uncle Grandpa upset like that makes me feel absolutely terrible. I wish I knew what he meant by "seeing us get hurt", though. "Alright, Uncle Grandpa. I'm really sorry about asking those questions. Please don't be upset!" I tried to comfort him as I put my hand on his shoulder. "It's okay, Mary. I think I need to lie down for a bit. How about you go check out the awesome stuff here." he suggested to me with a sad smile. He then seemed to disappear out of thin air.

I nodded and started towards the gift shop. When I entered, I saw a variety of novelties. There was also a section filled with candy and other sweet foods. Strangely enough, some of the seemingly useless knick-knacks looked like they could be useful at some point. I started down one of the aisles, only to find a bunch of Uncle Grandpa themed merchandise knocked down and replaced with Tanezumi themed merchandise. "Yeah, that Tanezumi is quite full of herself" I heard a proper voice say. I turned around and saw The Fart, who was holding onto what looked like a soap dispenser in the shape of Tanezumi's head. "It's quite a shame she'd knock down all of Uncle Grandpa's merchandise. In fact, I believe it was quite rude of her to do such a thing." he then smiled. "However, she has put up some quite useful things. Like this hand sanitizer bottle for instance. It is very important to keep clean!" He told me. "The more you know!" he gave me a sincere grin. I don't think he meant what he said in a sarcastic way, but usually when people give that phrase they are being sarcastic. He is a Disgustoid, though, so he probably does not understand what sarcasm even is. I also don't understand why he would care about hygiene. None the less, this is not a time to judge other people, especially since I know nothing of Digustoid culture to begin with. I nodded in response to his statement and continued down the aisle, looking at both the items on the floor and the items on the shelves. "It's kind of silly to have a gift shop when none of us have the money to pay for anything, though" I said out-loud. "Don't worry about that, Tanezumi said everything was free!" I heard a voice say. I looked up from whatever I was looking at to see Pizza Steve with a duffel bag filled with various items from around the gift shop. "You can't go wrong when everything is free, right?" he chuckled before handing me an empty duffel bag. "You should probably stock up before everyone else does" he suggested to me. "I'M GONNA TAKE IT ALL!" I heard a crazed voice say. I then saw Ramona with several duffel bags filled with various items, mostly candy. "THIS STORE WILL BELONG TO MY PIZZA PRINCE AND ME!" she told me with a cackle. Pizza Steve chuckled. "You gotta love this girl, recognizing my royalty!" _I don't know who's more arrogant, Pizza Steve or Tanezumi._ I began to take some things I felt I would need. I also decided to take some of my favorite candy from one of the candy shelves. My duffel bag wasn't too filled up like Pizza Steve's or Ramona's was, but I felt I got a decent amount of things that would come in handy to me later.

I left the gift shop and went into the cafeteria. It was a decent sized place with a large table that could seat twenty people. I squinted, as I began to find the numbering odd. There were originally twenty-one people here, including Uncle Grandpa makes twenty-two. The hotel had twenty-three rooms, but if including Uncle Grandpa there were twenty-two people, why was there one extra room? Come to think of it, I don't think I saw a picture on one of the doors. Why were there only twenty in the cafeteria if there was twenty-one people excluding Uncle Grandpa? I shook my head. These were questions I'd bring up with the group later. I looked up and saw Mr. Gus, Tiger, Beary Nice, and Dennis. "Hey look everyone, it's Mary!" Beary Nice pointed out in his loud and obnoxiously happy voice. "Hi Mary! Beary Nice to see you! WAIT! THAT'S ME!" he began to giggle. Dennis rolled his eyes. "You are the most annoying thing I have ever had the displeasure of meeting!" he hissed at Beary Nice.

"This cafeteria is quite a nice place!" Tiger grinned, ignoring Dennis and Beary Nice's shenanigans. "Don't you think, Mary?" she asked me. I nodded. "Yeah. Uncle Grandpa told me the food was really good." I responded. "I wonder who cooks the food." Mr. Gus didn't take his eyes off of the cafeteria set up. It looked like he was trying to look for something. "Maybe Uncle Grandpa does." Beary Nice suggested. Mr. Gus didn't respond to that suggestion, instead, he began to walk away from the group. "Where are you going?" Tiger asked him, going to follow him. Beary Nice chuckled. "That Mr. Gus sure is a serious fellow!" Dennis huffed and marched out of the cafeteria. I waved at Beary Nice and followed after Dennis. I didn't want to stay alone with Beary Nice, he gave me the creeps!

I went over to the game stands, and saw Billy and Slog playing a shoot-the-target game. Billy was teaching Slog how to aim the gun. "If you put your arms like this and look through this apparatus here, you'll be able to hit the target with more accuracy!" Billy instructed Slog in a kind and gentle voice as he helped position his arms. "Like this?" Slog seemed to be a bit lost. I smiled upon seeing them getting along so well despite our situation. I looked over at another game booth and saw Izzie again, this time with Frank.

"Franky~ there's surveillance cameras in our rooms" she told him with a pout on her face. Frank gulped in response. "Oh dear, that sounds very intrusive." he told her as he tapped his fingers together nervously. "I-I don't like being watched." Izzie grinned in response. "Don't worry, Franky~ If you come to my room I'll keep you nice and safe from the video cameras, Tanezumi, and anything else that could possibly hurt you~" she told him, but the grin on her face and the tone she said it in didn't sound like she had a genuine motive to protect him. "You're too kind" he told her. "I'll show you how _kind_ I really am" she giggled and waggled her eyebrows. He bit his lip and looked away. "Uh..."

_Izzie is crazy!_ I shook my head and walked away. I looked at my watch as I did, and saw it was almost 6 pm. _I should head back to the Hotel Lobby._ I began to hurry towards the hotel. I proceeded through the doors and found I was a bit early. Dingle and Festro were still playing foos ball. The Fart came down from the stair case and took a seat on one of the couches. "Oh, hello Mary! You are here quite early!" he greeted me. "I was just putting the supplies I gathered from the gift shop in the safety of my room."

"That's a good idea," I told him. "but I don't wanna be late for our meeting, so I'll just wait a few minutes for everyone to get here." He nodded in response and picked up one of the magazines sitting on the table. "Dear me, these magazines are a year old!" he said out loud. That was an interesting bit of information, I wonder why the magazines haven't been updated. As I waited for everyone to gather into the lobby, I began to think about the off numbers in the cafeteria and in the hotel rooms. I didn't get to think much about it, as everyone began to enter one after the other. Soon, all twenty of us were piled in the lobby. I wondered where Uncle Grandpa was, but I guess it's not all too important considering he knows more than we do and he's not willing to give us any information regarding what he knows right now.

"Alright," Mr. Gus's raspy voice filled the room and any side conversations going on at the time stopped. "What did everybody find?" Ham Sandwich clapped excitedly. "There is no need to worry any longer, Gweelok and I have found an arcade! Everything is going to be okay!" he declared in a triumphant voice. "Oh coolio, Gweelok, maybe you and my son can hack into one of the games to get us out of here!" Festro suggested as he clapped and rubbed his hands together. "For the last time, I am NOT your SON!" Ham Sandwich shouted at Festro. "That could perhaps be a possibility, I will see what I can do!" Gweelok nodded in response to Festro's suggestion. "Well, I found out the beach we woke up on is fake" Eric confessed to all of us. "Yeah! The ocean's not even real, it's literally just a really detailed painting!" Melvin backed up Eric's claim. "My Pizza Prince and I found the gift shop!" Ramona told all of us. "There is lots of items AND LOTS OF CANDY!"

"Interesting finds," Mr. Gus nodded and gave us a half grin. "Tiger and I found the cafeteria. I also tried to take a look in the kitchen, but the door seemed to be locked. It sounded like someone was cooking in there, though." A bunch of "hmm"'s filled the room before Slog spoke up. "I learned how to play the target game and aim a shotgun!" Slog professed to us proudly. Festro slapped himself in the forehead. "Ugh, great! Just what we need! Slog getting a hold of a weapon! He's planning to kill all of us!" A few people in the room gasped at Festro's speculation. "No! That's not true! I couldn't hurt anyone!" Slog panicked and began to tear up. "How do we know? You probably want out more than anything and will kill your bros to do just that!" Festro pointed at Slog as he accused him. "What?! NO!" Slog was crying at this point. "Leave him ALONE!" Billy angrily shouted at Festro. "Yeah, Festro, it's not nice to accuse people. Especially one of your best friends." The Fart scolded the purple beast man. "At this point, I can only trust Dingle! The rest of you could be plotting my death as we speak!" Festro accused everyone as he pointed his finger around everyone in the room. "Enough!" Mr. Gus shouted in a stern voice. He then turned to me. "Mary, what did you find?" he asked me. "Oh, well I took a look at the rooms upstairs. We all have assigned rooms with our pictures on it. I checked out my room and found a surveillance camera." I explained to all of them. "Yeah, I found a surveillance camera in my room, too" Izzie sighed. "Mine as well" The Fart confessed to us. "What does Tanezumi want to see with those surveillance cameras?" Mr. Gus stroked his goatee. Just then Tanezumi appeared before us. "I need to make sure none of you's tryin' to escape!" the pink rat told us. "I also need to make sure nothing inappropriate is going on! Some of you are underaged!" she crossed her arms and looked at Izzie. "I'm watching you, girlie! You better not be thinking of anything!" Tanezumi waved her finger at the dark haired girl. Izzie hissed. "Screw you!"

"Anyways, it's about dinner time, you should all go eat!" the pink rat told us. "Now scram!" and with that she disappeared. "What else can we do at this point?" Dennis sighed in frustration as he asked the rhetorical question. "Let's go" Mr. Gus lead all of us to the cafeteria. Once there, we were all happy to smell the aroma of fresh food. We all immediately formed a line at the counter, grabbing a tray. It seemed there was a robot behind the food counter, ready to serve us our food. "Oh look who it is!" Tiger pointed out in an excited voice. "It's Tiny Miracle!" Pizza Steve and Billy cheered. "Tiny Miracle the Robot Boy~ What would you like on your plate~?" the robot sang as it seemed to dance around waiting for a food order. _That's the finest chef Uncle Grandpa ordered?_ I must admit, the robot looked a bit ridiculous, but who am I to judge? I haven't even tried the food yet. Everyone placed their orders and soon enough everyone had full plates and were sitting at the table. We all began to eat our food. _Wow, Uncle Grandpa was right! This food is great!_

We were half-way through our meal when suddenly, a loud sound was heard. It almost sounded like a gunshot. Everyone gasped and turned to where the noise was. We saw...


	4. Chapter 4

We saw Tanezumi standing there with a smoking gun. The wall next to her had a bullet hole in it. She cackled. "Having a fulfilling dinner?" she asked us as she propped herself up on the table. We began to shield our plates of food to make sure she didn't step on it. "What's the matter? Am I not invited?"

"Not really, we don't want you here!" Dennis retorted. The pink rat pouted and lowered her head. "What a shame, this dinner is so boring without me!" she laughed. She trotted down to the middle of the table before standing in a heroic pose. It was ironic, because she was anything but heroic. "Anyways, are you ready for your incentives?" she asked us. "Incentives? What are you talking about?" Festro asked as his mouth was filled with food. "Your incentives to start killing each other already so you can get off this island! Duh!" Tanezumi mocked and belittled the purple beast man. "We're not killing anyone!" Mr. Gus insisted. She only laughed at him in response. _Did she take anything we said seriously?_ "You'll change your mind when you find out this little tidbit of information I'm about to give you..." she giggled. Everyone glared at her, but seemed to be on full attention. "Are you wondering why there's only twenty seats here?" she asked. I widened my eyes. I was thinking about that earlier! "Yes, what's wrong with this numbering? We had twenty-one people here originally, and these seats seem to be connected to the table, so it's not like you can just take away a seat." I leaned in more, interested in hearing the response. "Mary, what a smart girl you are!" she complimented me. "I'm so glad you noticed that!" she giggled. "Well, the reason there are only twenty seats, because there was only supposed to be twenty of you here!" she told us. "W-What do you mean?" Susie asked, trembling a bit. "What I mean is, one of you aren't supposed to be here! You sneaked in to help my endeavor of chaos!" she laughed. Everyone gasped, completely overtaken by surprise. "Y-You mean one of us is working for you?" Tiger's eyes were wide as she asked. "Yep!" Tanezumi cackled. "You can't trust anybody here because one of you is working for me!" The pink rat's gloating was cut short when Izzie gritted her teeth and began to speak. "That's stupid! Why would you give us that vital information. What if your helper is the one that gets murdered?" Some people were nodding their heads and muttering "yeah" in agreement to Izzie's question.

"Sacrifices must be made!" she told us. "I bet it's Uncle Grandpa!" Melvin hissed. "Nice try, Melvin! Uncle Grandpa isn't included with you guys. He's kinda on my status level, except he has less privilege." she told us with a giggle. "Good luck trying to find out who the traitor is, and hopefully someone will be dead by tomorrow morning so we can get this show on the road!" she told us with a cackle. "Good luck!" and with that Tanezumi disappeared. "WAIT A MINU-" but before Dennis could finish his sentence, the pink rat had disappeared. Dennis got up and punched the wall. "This is INSANE!" he screeched. "I bet that dirty rat is lying to us!" Eric speculated. "Yeah, no one could really be working for that scoundrel!" Izzie responded. "What a crock of shit!"  
"What if she's telling the truth, though" Gweelok twiddled his thumbs in a worried manner. "Well if you're working for Tanezumi, turn yourself in now and help us get out of here!" Pizza Steve demanded as he slammed his hands on the table. "It's very clear who the person working for Tanezumi is!" Festro said. Everyone turned their heads to him. "Huh?" we all were puzzled by his statement. "Yeah, the person working for Tanezumi is..." he got up and pointed at Beary Nice. "You, you little creep!" Beary Nice gasped. "M-Me? W-Why would you say that?!" Beary seemed offended and deeply hurt, his happy tone seemed to disappear. "Yeah! You're way too happy all the time, even when we found out we had to kill each other, that stupid grin on your face never faded!" Festro slammed his fist on the table. "You are working for Tanezumi! You know alot more than we do and you better spill the beans!"

Beary Nice sniffled as his eyes teared up. "W-Why are you treating me this way? I'm Beary Nice, I don't want to spread chaos and death!" he was crying now. "You're just trying to make us feel bad for you, but it's not working! We know what's up!" Festro stomped his foot. "Tell us all you know!" Dingle began to tug on Festro's muscle shirt, but Festro just swatted him away. Dingle cowered behind the chair in response.

"I-I don't know anything!" Beary sobbed. "TELL US NOW, YOU CREEP!" Festro screamed. Beary just cried more in response. Suddenly Frank stood up. "Hey! You stop that! Beary isn't working for Tanezumi!" Frank had a stern expression as he scolded Festro. "Beary Nice is my friend!"

"Maybe you're in cahoots! There's more than two traitors!" Festro hissed. "W-We're not traitors!" Frank frowned and put his arm around Beary in an attempt to comfort him. "Maybe it's Festro, because he's being a huge jerk-wad by accusing other people in an attempt to try and take the suspicion off himself!" Pizza Steve suggested with an annoyed tone in his voice. "You shut up, Pizza Man! You don't know what you're talking about!" Festro growled. "Don't you talk to the Pizza Prince that way! Know your place!" Ramona hissed. "Shut up, stupid girl! Go help Tiny Miracle in the kitchen!"

Ramona gasped before slamming her hands on the table. "PIG! Why I oughtta punch you in the face you ignorant slime!" Pizza Steve seemed a bit irritated. "Dude, don't talk to 'Mona like that!" Festro tugged on his own hair. "Don't tell me what to do! Look, all I know is we need to find the traitor and make sure to get rid of them!" Mr. Gus held the bridge of his nose as he let out a frustrated sigh. "This is exactly what Tanezumi wants! Stop this right now! I don't care WHO the traitor is, no one is getting rid of or killing anybody!" Unfortunately, Mr. Gus's usual voice of reason fell on deaf ears. "I think we need to get rid of you, Festro" Pizza Steve pointed an accusing finger at Festro. Festro growled. "We'll all get rid of you!" he screamed in response. "We should get rid of both of you, you're both stupid!" Izzie laughed. "Excuse you, girlie! Pizza Prince is not stupid!" Ramona hissed. "Oh look it's little miss kiss ass!" Izzie sneered. "Does that luscious ass of his taste like sausage? Or is it meatball? Pepperoni, maybe? I don't know, you tell me considering you lick it so much!" Ramona clenched her fists and seemed to make some kind of angry gurgling noise. Pizza Steve lowered his sunglasses and turned his gaze to Izzie. "Don't bring my anatomy into this. That's rude as fuck!" Izzie laughed in response. "I'll bring whatever I feel is necessary into this conversation!"

Ramona tugged on her own hair in irritation. "You better mind your manners when speaking to my Pizza Prince!" Izzie stood up. "How about you go lick your Pizza Prince's ass into oblivion, shut the hell up, and don't tell me what to do!" Izzie flipped her off as she mocked them. Pizza Steve let out a frustrated sigh. "Look, whether or not someone is royalty like I am, the kind of things you're talking about right now are really personal, quite vulgar, disgusting, and extremely rude!" he took off his sunglasses to reveal a stern and frustrated look. "Knock it off!" he bellowed. "Pfft, whatever! I'm out of here!" Izzie shrugged them off as she turned to walk away. Dennis had his head down on the table. I was surprised he didn't join in the argument, considering he was quite outspoken himself. However, I could tell he was as frustrated with everyone arguing as much as I was. I kept quiet, though, as I didn't want anyone yelling at me. Pizza Steve put his sunglasses back on. "That girl is vulgar and rude!" Ramona shut her eyes and shook her head. "Tsk tsk!"

"Guys, we should stop this fighting! It's really scary!" Slog bit his lip as he looked at everyone with concerned eyes. "You don't say a word, Mr. Target-Practice! You're trying to learn how to aim a gun so you can kill all of us!" Festro accused. Slog sniffled, and Billy immediately got up in anger. "Leave Slog out of this!"

"Oh here we go, Creep Number Two is ready to pipe in!" Festro mocked Billy. "I don't care what you say about me, but if you torment Slog one more time I will not hesitate to bite you in the nose!" Billy threatened. "I'd like to see you try!" Festro laughed. "Don't tempt me, buddy!" Billy narrowed his eyes. "Guys we shouldn't be fighting! Mr. Gus is right, this is EXACTLY what Tanezumi wants!" Tiger tried to reason with everyone. That, of course, fell on deaf ears as everyone began to bicker and argue with each other some more. Dingle was cowering behind Tiger now as Tiger gently placed her hand on his head in an attempt to comfort him. Mr. Gus had his head in his hands as he let out a frustrated sigh. Dennis finally put his head up, his eyes closed tightly in a frustrated expression. "Ugghh," he clenched his teeth before getting up, going over to the wall, and punching it several times. "SHUT UP! SHUT UP! SHUT UP! ALL OF YOU! SHUT UP!" Dennis shouted as he pounded his fists against the wall. Everyone fell silent as they looked at him. He turned to face us, his face bright red. You can tell he was fuming. "I don't know about you, but I don't want to sit here and play point the fingers! From the information we just heard, we cannot trust ANYBODY!" he pointed at all of us. "I don't know for sure who is the traitor, but I'm sure as hell not going to find out by getting killed!" He clenched his fists. "If you want to play point the fingers and argue with each other, go right ahead! I don't want ANY of you near me! Don't touch me! Don't even LOOK at me! I am NOT sticking around to get murdered, and if any of you had half a brain, you would do what I'm gonna do right now and that's lock myself up in my room!"

"You're gonna have to come out of your room eventually for food!" The Fart told him with concern in his voice. "Maybe I do, but I'm not going to discuss that with any of you if I want to stay alive, which I do!" Dennis stomped out of the cafeteria. Melvin soon got up too. "D-Dennis has a point! I-I don't wanna die!" Melvin bolted out of the cafeteria after Dennis. Festro crossed his arms. Ramona put her hands on her hips and looked around. The room had a disturbing silence. "So, there's not a single person in this room that can be trusted." Ham Sandwich broke the silence, forlorn in his voice. "NOOOO!" a familiar voice shouted. It was none other than Uncle Grandpa. He ran in frantically. "What has Tanezumi done to all of you?! You're all fighting and hating each other!" he was genuinely and deeply upset. "Please do not hate each other! You are all friends, even if you don't know everyone that well yet!" Uncle Grandpa put his hands on Pizza Steve's shoulders. "C'mon, Pizza Steve!" he then went over to Ham Sandwich and put his hands on his shoulders as well. "Ham Sandwich, c'mon!" he pranced over to Festro. "Festro, lighten up!" He twirled and put his arm around Ramona. "Ramona Desdemona!" He pranced up onto the table and looked around at everyone with his arms open. "Don't let Tanezumi ruin your existing friendships or friendships that you could be making right now!"

Everyone looked around at each other, but remained silent. "No one here is committing any murder, okay?" Uncle Grandpa smiled with tears in his eyes. "I believe in each and every one of you!" Pizza Steve nodded. "Uncle G, you are absolutely right! We let Tanezumi's tricks get the best of us!"

Festro didn't seem to pleased. He smacked his forehead. "What about the traitor?" Uncle Grandpa shook his head. "If there even is a traitor, which I highly doubt, I'm sure the traitor will come around and not do what they originally set out to do, because they'll realize friendship, happiness, and Uncle Grandpa-i-ness is more important than death and chaos!"

Despite the "Uncle Grandpa-i-ness" part of his speech not making sense, I had hope in what he was saying. If there was a traitor like Tanezumi said, they will hopefully come around and try to help us rather than destroy us, especially if they run the risk of dying themselves. "Thanks, Uncle Grandpa" Mr. Gus smiled and nodded. "No Problemo, Mr. Gus!" the old man grinned and did a little jig off of the table. "It's getting late, but you all still have some free time, why don't you all try and get along now rather than fight?" he suggested to us. With that, he disappeared. Festro laughed. "HA! Screw that! I STILL don't trust any of you!" he said as he began to walk toward the exit. "I'm not gonna stick around here!" he immediately exited the cafeteria. Everyone was silent for a few moments, but soon Mr. Gus's voice broke the silence. "Alright, we have about 3 hours before 11 PM when everything closes, which is plenty of time, but let's talk about setting up some rules we should follow to keep things organized and everyone safe." Mr. Gus suggested. Again, that sounded like a reasonable plan. Mr. Gus was very reasonable and logical even through all of these disturbing events. He was our rock and almost like the unofficial leader. "Let's start with bed times" he told us. "Aww man that's dumb!" Pizza Steve put his palm against his forehead. "I'm not saying you have to go to sleep by a certain time, but I am saying that we should all be in our rooms by 11 PM when everything closes. It's too dangerous to be wandering out here late at night when nothing is opened. It's risky and can get somebody killed" he told us. Tiger nodded. "Yeah, and we'll stay in our rooms until 9 AM when everything opens back up!" she told us.

"Exactly!" Mr. Gus nodded. "Next thing is by 9 AM we should all meet here in the cafeteria for breakfast!" Guillermo said. "Well, I think they serve breakfast." Ham Sandwich put his hands on his hips. "They BETTER serve breakfast!" Gweelok nodded in agreement. _How are those two not twins?_ "Yeah, good idea! We'll meet here for when they serve breakfast, lunch, and dinner!" Eric added into the conversation. Everyone seemed to agree. "Alright, now that those ground rules have been established, we can all continue exploring." Mr. Gus told us as he got up. "Or we could just hang out and try to enjoy the attractions." Pizza Steve suggested as he tipped his sunglasses. "I mean, we had a pretty rough day, Pizza Steve thinks we all need to take a break and have some fun!" _Did he really just refer to himself in third person? This guy is even more self-absorbed than I thought. At least he can be reasonable at times._

"I wanna go on the rides!" Guillermo jumped up excitedly. He then turned to Susie and Eric. "C'mon, guys! Let's go!" he practically grabbed their hands and dragged them off. "C'mon Mr. Gus, we can go on the rides together and take a break from all this serious stuff!" Tiger put her hands on his shoulders as she encouraged him to come with her. She began to give him a mini massage. Mr. Gus sighed. "I feel like I need to look into more things about this place, but thank you for the offer, Tiger." Tiger sighed. "Aww, alright." Tiger turned to Dingle who has been kind of hanging around next to her from when they were all arguing before. "Hey, Dingle. Do you want to go on the rides with me?" she asked. Dingle gave her a big grin and nodded. Ramona laughed. "Tiger, Dingle! Join me and my Pizza Prince!" she said as she hooked arms with him. Pizza Steve grinned. "Surrounded by two pretty ladies~" he waggled his eyebrows before losing his grin and looking at Dingle. "And... whatever you are" Dingle looked a bit upset. "My prince! Please be kind to Dingle!" Ramona seemed a bit frustrated. They all exited the cafeteria. I decided to get up and take another look around, myself.

Mostly everyone was enjoying the rides, which were all being operated by Uncle Grandpa. He cheerfully shouted Good Morning before starting every ride. At the game stands, Billy and Slog we're playing a game of Roll-A-Ball with The Fart. Frank stood on the side lines of the game watching them. I decided to go in the arcade. As I made my way to the arcade, I bumped into Beary Nice, who looked like he was in a big rush. "Excuse me, Mary, I need to get a Beary Nice surprise for Hot Dog Person!" he told me as he continued to run off to the gift shop. He ran off so quick I didn't even have a chance to respond to him. _Why does he call Frank Herbert the Hot Dog Person? That's a silly name!_ I shook my head and proceeded to the arcade. There, Gweelok and Ham Sandwich were delved into one of the first person shooter games. Good, they are distracted! Now is my chance to play a few games before they get upset with me. I grinned deviously as I made my way over to one of the win a prize game. It was the stacker game, I was always good at that game! Or so I thought. I'd get all the way to the top and mess up on the last one. I continued to try and try, but to no avail. I was finally going to win, but a voice broke through my concentration. "What happened to everyone hating each other?" the voice asked me. I let out a frustrated sigh as I turned around to see Izzie. _Izzie? I thought she was done dealing with everyone for the day?_ "I'm sorry, did I screw up your gaming zone?" she asked rather sympathetically. "It's okay, Izzie. It's just a game" I reassured her. "Well I feel your pain, man. There's nothing worse than when you're in the zone and someone interrupts you! That's the worst!" she confessed to me. "I hate it when I'm in the art zone, drawing my drawings or painting my paintings, and some loser comes in and tries to talk to me! Ugh! So annoying!" I laughed and nodded at her little story. "Anyways, how did everyone manage to start getting along again?" she asked. "Uncle Grandpa gave us a little pep talk, then we established some ground rules that we should all follow to remain safe." I told her. "Oh, I see" she giggled. "What kinda rules?" she asked. "Be in your room by 11 PM and don't come out until 9 AM, and meet everyone for breakfast, lunch, and dinner" I told her. "Ah, okay" she nodded. "That sounds pretty reasonable, I think I will attend to the festivities" she giggled. "That's cool, but I think you should apologize to Ramona and Steve when you do." I told her.

"Why? They we're being such morons!" she told me. "Well, what you said to them was kinda vulgar and not nice at all. You can express your opinions without doing that, you know." I tried my best to be stern without coming off as too naggy. Izzie just smiled in response. "Something tells me you're one of those goodie two-shoes!" I sighed. "No, I just think you went to far, is all!" I told her with a bit of a whiny voice. I didn't mean to whine, but I want her to be nice to everyone else like she slightly is to me. "Fine, fine," she pinched my cheek. "Anything for you, Mary~!" she giggled._Creepy..._ "Now where's Franky boy? I want to touch his crazy hair!" she giggled and ran out of the arcade. I shook my head and continued to play the stacking prize game. I got a bit tired of that game and began to play some of the other games. Gweelok and Ham Sandwich noticed me there, but I guess they didn't really care. I guess as long as I'm not playing a game they want to play, then they are okay with me being there. I played a bunch of games, even played a few games with Eric and Pizza Steve when they came in to visit the arcade. Before I knew it, it was 11 PM. We knew it was 11 PM too because a loud and obnoxious chime was sounded before the TVs next to the surveillance cameras all turned on in unison. On the screen, Tanezumi was sitting in a chair in what looked like a newscaster station. She had a wig on that was styled to look like your typical newscaster's hair style. "Hey you little shits! It's 11 PM, the amusement park is CLOSED! You better get your stupid butts out of attraction buildings and off the rides because after this time of night, there is nothing here for you! Come back at 9 AM when the park reopens. Au Revoir~" and with that, the TV clicked off.

Everyone shuffled back to the hotel and went up to their rooms. When I got into my room, I felt quite exhausted. I freshened up in the bathroom a bit and got into a nice pair of pajamas provided for me in one of the dressers and immediately plopped on the bed. I have to admit, having a surveillance camera eyeing me in the middle of the night made it hard for me to fall asleep. Honestly, I didn't get that much of a good night's sleep. I did drift off to sleep eventually, though. _Tomorrow begins a new day._


	5. Intermission 1

❀ ✿ TANEZUMI'S TALK SHOW ✿ ❀  
(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ～『✧~*_Oh hello all thank you all for coming! I'm your host Tanezumi, here to tell you all about Tamezumi! YAY! Tamezumi is a pretty young rat who came from Japan! She moved to America at a wee young age. A small town in the state of Michigan called Noir Town! It was a cold and lonely place, everytime she tried to find a home, the nasty human people would kick her out with brooms. Heck, they even tried to kill poor Tanezumi by setting up nasty traps and putting poison in her food! Tanezumi had enough of that, though. So she set up a bunch of human traps in the town that treated her quite awfully and laughed when they all fell for it! She even poisoned the food in their resturaunts! Soon the whole town was wiped out! HAHAHA! Suckers! Karma is a bitch, ain't it! ~(⊙ω⊙✿)』_


	6. Chapter 5

I was awoken by the same loud and obnoxious chime that I heard last night at 11 PM. "Get up, little shits! The amusement park is now open! Enjoy the festivities of the day before our closing time!" I heard Tanezumi's voice chirp after the alarm before the TV clicked off. I yawned and got up, immediately going into the bathroom to freshen up. I looked in the night stand drawer and found normal everyday clothes that were my size that I would normally wear. I'm not sure if Uncle Grandpa or Tanezumi had put them there, but whoever did I am grateful that I have this. Once I was dressed and freshened up, I made my way down the stairs and headed over to the cafeteria. Just as I expected, breakfast was being served and everyone except Dennis, Melvin, and Festro were in the cafeteria. "Thank you for apologizing to us, Izzie" I heard Pizza Steve's voice. I turned to see Izzie speaking with Pizza Steve and Ramona. They all seemed to be getting along now. I smiled, glad that Izzie took my advice. "Where's Dennis, Melvin, and Festro?" Mr. Gus asked everyone. "They don't know about the meeting times." Izzie told him. "You weren't here when we discussed this, either, why did you come?" Mr. Gus asked her. "Mary told me about it!" she responded. Mr. Gus nodded and looked around. Frank was standing timidly and nervously, a look of distress on his face. "What's the matter, Frank?" I asked him.

Everyone turned to look at him. Frank shifted uncomfortably. "Uhm, well... it's just that I haven't seen Beary since 8:15 last night!" he told us as he bit his lip. "I-I went to watch Billy's game of Roll-A-Ball with Slog and The Fart, but Beary went somewhere else. He told me he'd be right back. When he didn't come back after a while I went to look for him, but I wasn't able to find him!" he looked really distressed. "I-I hope nothing happened to him! Usually bad things happen to me, not him!" After he spoke, tears began to fall from his eyes. Mr. Gus became wide eyed before getting up. "Have ANY of you seen Beary?" he asked all of us. Everyone shook their heads. "We need to go find him!" Mr. Gus pushed his breakfast aside. "We'll split into three groups. Tiger, Steve, Billy, and Ramona will come with me to the Arcade. Mary, Frank, Slog, Izzie, and Dingle will search the Gift Shop. The rest of you search the hotel!" he told us as he hurriedly ran out of the cafeteria. His group followed after him. Izzie motioned for our group to follow her. "C'mon! We're not going to find that chubby creep if we stand around!" Ignoring her comment, we all followed her to the gift shop. We all spread out through the store, checking every aisle.

I got to an aisle lined with freezers that I hadn't noticed upon my first visit. There were ice cream and other various frozen foods in this aisle. I looked around for Beary Nice, when suddenly I saw a freezer that seemed to have a large black garbage bag inside of it. Finding it strange, I opened it up, and it immediately fell over with a large thud. I bent down slowly, reaching my hand to grab onto the bag. When I got a hold of it, I pulled it in hopes of revealing its contents, instead of items falling out, I ended up ripping the bag and finding myself face to face with the corpse of Beary Nice. I let out a loud scream as I fell back and crawled away from the terrifying sight. "HE'S DEAD! HE'S DEAD! GOOD LORD HE'S DEAD!" I screamed as everyone in my group rushed over to see what I was screaming about. Everyone else let out a scream too when they saw him. Frank burst into tears and fell to his knees. "No, no, no! This is not happening!" Frank sobbed.

Suddenly, we heard a loud bell ring noise as the TV popped on. Tanezumi was in what looked like a party hat and had 2 noise makers in each hand. She started to sing to the tune of the Mail Song from Blues Clues. "WE JUST FOUND A BODY~ WE JUST FOUND A BODY~ WE JUST FOUND A BODY~ I WONDER WHO KILLED IT!" she set the noise makers off with a loud cackle before the TV shut off. "What a sicko!" Slog shouted at the TV. "I'm going to go get everyone else!" said Izzie as she set off to go get everyone else. I sat in the fetal position against one of the freezers on the back wall. _This can't be happening! None of this is happening!_ I rocked myself back and forth. Soon everyone from this morning piled into the gift shop and surrounded Beary Nice's cold, dead corpse. There were a few screams heard in the crowd. Frank went over to Beary's dead body and cradled his head in his hands. "Beary, you always encouraged me to get out there and try new things! You tried so hard to help me get over my fears, even if they weren't always successful..." he sobbed. "I'll never forget you, my best friend..."

"This is awful!" Gweelok exclaimed. Just then, Tanezumi appeared before us. "Finally! I didn't think you'd actually do it, but the first sacrifice has been made and we can all live happily now!" she said. "You sick freak!" Pizza Steve hissed. "Be happy that's not you, Steve-o" she laughed. Just then, Uncle Grandpa came in. When he saw Beary Nice's corpse, he screamed. "NO! NOT BEARY!" he screeched as he began to cry. "Shut it, old man!" Tanezumi ordered him. "Why did you kill Beary, Tanezumi?!" Uncle Grandpa sobbed as he slapped his palms against his cheeks. "I didn't kill Beary! One of your friends here did!" Tanezumi pointed at all of us with a smirk. "That's not true! They wouldn't kill anyone!" Uncle Grandpa turned to look at us, his eyes red from all the crying. "Would you?" he sniffled as he practically whispered the question.

"Anyways, you're probably wondering what happens from here, right?" she asked. Everyone was silent as they glared at her. "Well I'll tell ya! We're gonna hold a death match!" she proclaimed. "Ugh, I can't believe I came out of my room for this shit!" Dennis hissed. "First, someone gets murdered, now you want us to witness even MORE people getting murdered? I'm not participating in this anymore!" Dennis threw his hands up as he began to walk out. "Dennis, if you don't participate, you will suffer the same fate Remo and Beary have reached." she told him. "In fact, that is a new rule. You will participate in the death match, whether it be in the crowd or in the actual fight, or else you will be killed!" she told all of us. Dennis let out a frustrated sigh. "But, if we have to fight in a death match, we're going to die anyways!"

"You at least have a 50% chance of making it out alive if you participate" she told him. "Well what is this crap all about anyways?" he asked. "Well, death matches take place after someone in the amusement park gets murdered. For this death match, you must pick two suspects of the murder that took place. In order to determine the suspects, I will allow an investigation to take place before the death match. When the death match is ready to begin, I will let you all have a meeting to discuss your ideas so that everyone can agree on 2 suspects. Once you all agree on your 2 suspects, the 2 suspects will choose a weapon and duke it out in the death match, where they fight to the death. The object of the one on one death match is to make sure you survive and your opponent dies. The death match can go on for as long as possibly needed until someone is killed." she explained to us. "So I would get cracking on that investigation now!" she ordered us as she turned her back to us. "Wait a minute! What if neither of the two suspects we pick are the murderers?" Dennis inquired. Tanezumi turned around to face him. "The murderer gets a special prize that will help them continue murdering and each of you will have to participate in a punishment session immediately after breakfast the next morning" she told all of us. "Good! We don't have to really try, then. We can just get on with our lives now!" Melvin hurriedly said as he was ready to leave the gift shop. "Oh no, Melvin. My punishment sessions are quite grueling, and you will not want to participate in one of those, especially since you don't even have access to an infirmary yet." Tanezumi laughed. "Not only that, but we can't let innocent people die because we didn't choose the correct person!" Tiger added in. "What if the murderer wins against the innocent person if we DO choose the right person?" Dennis inquired further. "I have a special surprise for that..." she giggled ominously. "Is that all with the questions, Dennis?"

Everyone was silent at this point, trying to let the absurdly cruel and disturbing rules of this sick game sink in. Tanezumi turned her back to us and started to walk off. Then she stopped and turned her head. "Oh yeah, one more thing..." she slapped down a folder. "This will come in handy for your investigation. I will give this to you every investigation we have. Ta-ta!" she told us before disappearing in thin air. Pizza Steve picked up the folder and opened it. "What is it?" Ham Sandwich asked nervously. Pizza Steve tipped his glasses and widened his eyes as he read whatever was inside the folder. "I-It's like an autopsy report!" he told us. Everyone gasped. Frank just cried more and continued to cradle Beary's head in his arms. _Beary really was dead. This was really happening._ Pizza Steve cleared his throat as he began to read the report. "Beary Nice was murdered at 8:30 PM in the Gift Shop. He was stabbed 3 times in the abdomen and suffered blunt trauma to the head. His body was stored in the freezer a few minutes after his death." After Pizza Steve read the report out loud, he put down the folder. "This is too much, man..." he slid down the wall behind him and sat down. "Well, we aren't going to figure anything out by just standing around!" Dennis said as he stood in front of everyone. "We'll need to perform an investigation like they do on those crime shows!" he told us. "We don't even have the proper forensic equipment for that!" Susie reminded all of us. "Even if we did, I don't think most of us even know how to use it!" Eric added in.

"Well, I think if we solve this by deductive reasoning, we will be able to make logical and educated accusations" Mr. Gus theorized. "So let's start looking around!" Tiger had a determined look on her face. "Hold on, we need someone to watch the body to make sure no one tampers with the evidence!" Izzie added in. "I'll stay here" Frank said between sobs. "I'll make sure no one tries to hide anything, plus I'm too upset to figure out mysteries" he leaned up against one of the freezers. "I'll help watch the body, too. I-I'm not smart enough for this kind of stuff" Slog stepped up next to Frank. "Are you sure? I think you could help us a great deal!" Billy tried to reassure him as he put his hand on his shoulder. Slog just shook his head. "I'm sorry, Billy, but I just can't do this. I promise I won't let anything more happen to Beary Nice!" Slog promised.  
"Okay, the investigation starts now!" Mr. Gus said as everyone looked around to find clues.


	7. Chapter 6

The first thing I logically thought to do was examine the body. That was one of the most key things to examine in the crime shows on TV, so I figured I'd imitate that to the best of my ability. _I really don't want to do this!_ Slog helped me take the plastic bag off, despite the fact we both were disgusted with handling a corpse. After we took the plastic bag off, I tried my best to examine his wounds without touching him. There were three stab wounds on his abdomen, like the file said. His head was also bashed in with a blunt object, just like the file said. I shuddered as I observed the wounds. Upon my observation, I noticed something interesting in his hand. Before I went ahead went to investigate, however, I looked up at Frank and Slog. "Hey, is it alright if I take and look at whatever Beary is holding here? I promise I will put it back as soon as I am done looking!" They both nodded in response to my question and watched me carefully take it from his hands. It was a bit hard too, considering he was frozen and I'm sure by now rigor mortis had set in. Upon looking at the package, I noticed it contained a set of friendship necklaces. They were Uncle Grandpa themed, and had Uncle Grandpa holding up a rainbow that said "Best Friends". In the middle of the words, there was a small crack in between the words where the necklace can detach and attach as much as one pleases. I then began to remember my brief meeting with Beary Nice last night when I was heading over to the arcade. "Excuse me, Mary, I need to get a Beary Nice surprise for Hot Dog Person!" Beary told me as he continued to run off to the gift shop.

I shook my head and bit my lip as I put the package back in his hand. That must have been a present for Frank. This makes the situation at hand even worse. _He died trying to get a present for his best friend!_ I got up and put my hand on Slog's shoulder. "Hey, Slog, while you're here guarding Beary, make sure you keep Frank some company as well. I know we're all going through a rough time right now, but he seems to be suffering more so than any of us considering he lost his best friend." I told him. Slog nodded in agreement before gently patting Frank's back. "I'm here for you if you need me, buddy!" Slog reassured him. Frank did not respond, but was staring off in the distance instead. He was really shaken up from all of this. _This also probably isn't the time to ask him why Beary called him Hot Dog Person._ I thought to myself. I got up and began to look around the rest of the gift shops for clues on who the murderer could be, dismissing the other thought that came into my mind as an inside joke between them.

"Yo, Mary. Come check this out." I heard Pizza Steve call to me. I saw him standing in the next aisle motioning for me to come over. I did and when I stood where he was standing, my mouth dropped. There in the middle of the aisle was a sloppy and rather large smear of blood on the floor. It looked like someone was trying to clean it up, but didn't have much time. "Someone's not very good at cleaning up messes" Pizza Steve pointed out. "It looks like the person was in a hurry," I began. "I think it's safe to say this was not premeditated." Suddenly, I heard Mr. Gus's voice directly behind us. "You're right. Whoever killed Beary was in quite a hurry." he theorized with us. "I wonder where he hid the cleaning supplies?" Pizza Steve tapped his index finger against his chin. "Would it be too obvious to hide it in the janitor's closet?" he asked as he pointed to the door on the wall directly at the end of the aisle. "It's worth a shot" Mr. Gus said as he walked around to the next aisle as to not walk through the crime scene evidence. Pizza Steve and I followed him. Once there, I slowly turned the door handle and opened the door. I was surprised it wasn't locked. "It wasn't locked?" I asked out loud. Suddenly, Tanezumi appeared behind us. "For investigation purposes, I made sure all locked doors relevant to this case are unlocked!" she told us. "However, this door never had a lock on it to begin with! The lock is broken" she told us with a giggle. With that she disappeared. Taking note of the information she gave us, we proceeded into the closet. Pizza Steve clicked on the light. Sure enough, there was a bunch of cleaning supplies in here. "I don't see anything that would have cleaned up the crime scene." Pizza Steve shrugged. Mr. Gus squinted before pointing at something in the closet. "Look again, Steve." he told him. Steve lowered his sunglasses to take a closer look. I squinted as well to see what he was pointing at. Way in the back of the closet was a mop soaked with blood. The blood looked a bit watered down, as whoever was using it looked like they were trying to clean the blood off of the mop. "I wonder why they were in such a hurry" I wondered out loud. "Perhaps they knew someone was coming to the gift shop." Mr. Gus stroked his goatee. "We should probably gather information on where people were at 8:30 last night." he suggested

"Hey, what's this?" Pizza Steve bent over and picked up a small box. The small box was ripped open. I inspected it closer. "It looks like a box of garbage bags!" I told them. "That's why Beary was wrapped in a garbage bag. We should probably check out the aisle these came from." Mr. Gus suggested to us again. "I'm gonna go check that out." Pizza Steve told us as he walked away. "While you do that, I'm gonna look for more clues and maybe ask people about what they were doing last night at 8:30" Mr. Gus told us as he walked away as well. I shut the closet door and went on to search for more clues. As I looked around, I saw Ramona staring at something on the wall. I went up to her. "What's up, Ramona?" I asked her. Ramona flicked her tongue around, not taking her eyes off the wall. She finally responded to me. "What happened to the small statue of Uncle Grandpa on this shelf?" she asked me as she pointed. I looked and saw an empty shelf. "Huh" I was a bit surprised. If Tanezumi had knocked it down, I'm sure she would have replaced it with a statue of herself. However, there was nothing there. You could tell something had been there previously, because there was a round clean spot in the middle of the shelf while the rest of it was dusty. I tried to reach up to the shelf to see just how high up it was. Despite the fact I wasn't short, I was not tall enough to reach anything on the shelf. "Someone tall must have took it down" I speculated. Ramona tried to reach the shelf too. She was a bit short, but even in her high heels she wasn't able to reach it. "Yeah" she agreed. "Could they have stood up on something?" she asked me. I looked around in the immediate area, and found a stack of boxes. I went over to them to see if they were sturdy enough. "Well, these could certainly be used" I told her. "So really, anyone of any height could have taken it down." Ramona nodded. "I'm going to look around some more." I told her as I continued my way through the store.

Dennis was behind the faux check out counter. I decided to talk to him and see if he found anything of importance. "Hey Dennis, did you find anything?" I asked him. He looked like he was searching the cubby-holes under the counter. "Not yet. I'm trying to find the murder weapon." he told me. "Wouldn't it be a knife?" I asked him. "Ugh no! Did you even HEAR Pizza Steve when he was reading the autopsy report-like file?" he rolled his eyes at me. "Beary suffered blunt trauma to the head. Obviously that's what killed him! Just because you got stabbed doesn't automatically mean you're going to die." he explained to me. "I've accidentally stabbed myself in the side. It wasn't severe enough to kill me but I did need stitches!" he told me his story, but in a rather frustrated manner. I nodded, but I kinda wish he wasn't being such a jerk about the whole thing. Suddenly Dennis gasped. "W-What's this?" he began to take his arm out of one of the cubby-holes he was searching in. He gasped when he pulled out a statue of Uncle Grandpa with blood on the base where the statue stands. "You found the murder weapon!" I gasped. "Perhaps, let me see if this matches the wound on Beary's head!" he said as he slid over the counter and went to the freezer aisle. He nodded at Slog and Frank before putting the statue's base next to the wound on Beary Nice's head. "Yep, that's it!" Dennis confirmed. _This is all so strange. What does this all mean?_

Dennis put the statue next to Beary. "There's no sense in hiding it again, I'll just keep it next to Beary." Dennis shrugged. Frank sighed and hugged his knees closer to his body. I gave the faux check out desk another look over. As I inspected the counter, I noticed a piece of blue cloth hanging on a small nail that was on the wall behind the counter. It looked like a part of someone's shirt. _Well this seems like it'll be important later on._

I decided that it was time for me to start talking to people about where they were at 8:30. I looked around in the gift shop and only saw Dennis, Slog, and Frank. Everyone else must have gone out to look for more clues or to collect alibis on people for 8:30 last night. Dennis was on his way out of the gift shop, so I decided to stop him before he left. "If you don't mind me asking, do you remember seeing anything strange at 8:30 last night?" I asked him. Dennis shook his head. "No, I was in my room the whole time. In fact, I went to bed pretty early because all the crap that happened yesterday gave me a headache!" he confessed to me. "I see." I nodded and let him go on his way. I went up to Slog and Frank after speaking with Dennis. "I don't mean to bring this up, but I feel it would be important to know if you noticed anything strange going on at 8:30 last night." I ran the question by them. Slog shook his head. "Nah, I was playing Roll-A-Ball with Billy and The Fart. Frank asked us a where Beary was but that was about it. For the most part Frank was with us around 8:30 watching us play before he set off to look for Beary." he confessed to me. Frank nodded. "Yes, and I went to go look for Beary but I couldn't find him. I even went in the gift shop around 8:50. I don't know how I missed it. No one was in the gift shop at the time either." he sighed.

I nodded. "Alright, thank you. Sorry to bother you." Slog shook his head. "You're not bothering us Mary, you do what you need to do to figure this out!" he reassured me. I nodded and headed out of the gift shop. There I saw Izzie staring at something in the garbage can. I went up to her, and she immediately looked up and greeted me. "Just the girl I wanted to see!" she told me. "Y-Yes?" I became a bit nervous. _What could she possibly want to see me for?_ Izzie pointed to something in the garbage. "The murderer was not very smart at all!" she told me. I peeked over at what she was pointing at and found the Tanezumi themed pocket knife from the gift shop. It was covered in blood. "I wonder if the person actually WANTED to get caught!" Izzie laughed. "Did you see anything strange at 8:30 last night?" I asked her, getting right down to business with her. "I saw Melvin on my way to the arcade" she told me. "Melvin?" I asked her. "Yeah, I was surprised to. I asked him why he decided to join us and he told me he was in a hurry to have a meeting with someone. He didn't specify who. That was around 8:25 I believe. Then I went and talked to you in the arcade and left the arcade around 8:40. When I left, I saw Festro. I would have asked him what he was doing, but I refuse to speak to scum like him. So I went on my way looking for Franky." she explained to me. I nodded. "I see. That's very interesting, actually." I told her. "I'm glad it's useful for ya" she giggled. "However, I have one question. What made you decide to leave your room?" I asked her. She shrugged. "I was hanging around a little bit and figured 'They're probably done fighting by now and I'm bored. I wanna talk to Franky!' so I left my room to go hang out with Franky, but I didn't find him until 9. He seemed a bit on edge but we were able to hang out, eat some cotton candy, and chit chat a little." she confessed to me. "And if you're worried about my alibi, remember we saw each other around 8:30 and if you wanna ask Franky if we hung out together he'll tell you the same thing I'm tellin' ya!" she told me. I shook my head. "No, Izzie, I believe you! Thank you for telling me all of this." Izzie giggled. "Anything for you, Mary~" she smiled mischievously and walked away. _Again with that creepy comment!_

I headed over to where the game area was and saw Pizza Steve and Mr. Gus discussing something. "Oh hey, Mary! Did you find anything interesting?" Pizza Steve asked me. "Well Dennis found the murder weapon that the murderer hit Beary over the head with, Izzie found a bloody pocket knife used to stab Beary, and Izzie told me she saw Melvin walking around before 8:30." I told them. Mr. Gus nodded and made that "Not Bad" face you see in that outdated internet meme with the same name. "That is interesting information, Mary. Thank you." he seemed pleased. "Well, I actually came over here to ask you if you saw anything strange at 8:30 last night."

Pizza Steve shrugged. "Nah, I was enjoying rides with Mona, Tiger, and Dingle. Susie, Guillermo, and Eric were on the rides with us too" he told me. Mr. Gus shook his head. "I was trying to peek over the locked gate, but I wasn't able to see anything." he told me. "I then went to the cafeteria to help Tiny Miracle tidy things up then headed over to the hotel to check out the lobby and examine my room a bit more" he told me. _Wow, he's not only very logical and practical, he has alot of work ethic._ I thought. I wasn't sure if I liked it or if I thought he was too rigid. I nodded and thanked them for their time. As I was about to find others to speak to, I heard a large chime as all the TVs clicked on simultaneously. It was none other than Tanezumi. "It's your half hour warning! You better finish up your investigations before the Death Match begins!" she warned us. _I better hurry and finish asking people about what they saw_


	8. Chapter 7

I figured I would skip Ham Sandwich and Gweelok because I knew they were in the Arcade the whole time. I saw them hustling about in there while I was playing games myself, so they couldn't have witnessed anything strange. I also decided to leave out Guillermo, Susie, and Eric because Pizza Steve said they were on the rides around the time of Beary's murder with him and some others. I also wanted to leave out The Fart and Billy because they were playing Roll-A-Ball. I decided to go ahead and find Festro and Melvin and speak to them. I went back to the hotel lobby and found Festro standing by the foos ball table. "Hi Festro" I greeted as politely as I could. "What do you want?" he asked me rather rudely. "Well, I just wanted to know if you saw anything strange at 8:30" I asked him. He shook his head. "I was in my room!" he told me. He seemed rather short like as if he was brushing me off. "Well did anything happen before or after that? I only ask because this is important for the meeting." I was hoping he'd understand. He nodded and sat down on one of the nearby chairs. "Well at around 8:20 someone slipped a note under my door. It was a note from Dennis to meet him in the Gift Shop at 8:45. I wasn't exactly sure what Dennis wanted, so I prepared myself for whatever he was planning and headed over there at around 8:40. I got there at 8:45 and was greeted by Melvin, who walked in shortly after and told me he had also gotten a note from Dennis for that same time. I figured Dennis was playing a stupid prank on us so I walked back to the hotel with Melvin and went back to my room, so did he." he told me. I nodded. "Why would Dennis play a prank on you?" I asked. "I don't know, he's a weird kid with a short fuse!" he brushed it off like it was nothing. "Though, between you and me, I think he was planning to kill me or Melvin, but Beary came in at the wrong time and died in his place." he theorized. I nodded. That would explain why Festro and Melvin both met there. "I think your story is helping things come together." I told him. "Thank you for your time" I nodded. "Ah, no problem, kid! Whatever that punishment Tanezumi was talking about is, I do NOT want to find out." he chuckled. "Do you know where Melvin is now?" I asked him. Festro shrugged. "I think he's in his room. I saw him go up there earlier." he told me. I nodded and went up stairs. I knocked on Melvin's door. "Hey Melvin, it's Mary. I just wanna ask you something really quick" I told him. "L-Like what?" I heard him ask from behind the door. "Well, I wanted to know if you saw anything strange at 8:30 last night."

Just then, Melvin cracked open the door and peeked his head out. "I was in my room the whole night!" he told me in a short manner. "Festro told me he saw you at 8:45. Izzie also told me she saw you at 8:25." I told him. He narrowed his eyes at me. "W-Well I received a note from Dennis to meet him over at 8:45. I went 20 minutes early to make sure it wasn't some kind of trap. I saw Beary Nice getting something off the shelf at that time, and saw no apparent danger, so I left and went back to my room. I then headed back over there around 8:40 and met up with Festro at 8:45. That's it!" he told me. "I wish I stayed longer, I could have prevented Beary's death. I'm sure Dennis did it because he didn't even show up to meet me and Festro at our meeting time!" he confessed. I nodded. "Festro speculated the same thing." I told him. I know Festro said between me and him, but I figured he was going to have to give his ideas to everyone at the meeting later so it doesn't really matter.

Just then a large chime rung and the televisions turned on simultaneously again. "The big event you've been waiting for! The death match! Meet me immediately in the hotel's courtyard!" Tanezumi clapped excitedly before the TV shut off. "We better get going then" Melvin told me as he exited his room and shut the door. He dashed off before I could answer him. _I'm not sure if he's acting strange because of the murder or because we are in this crazy situation. Either way, I think I should keep an eye on him._

I made my way down to the courtyard. Everyone was standing in front of the Tanezumi statue. The real Tanezumi stood on that statue's platform. "I hope you got all the information you needed for the meeting, because you're going to need it!" she told us before clapping and jumping off the platform. Everyone backed up as part of the statue opened up to reveal an elevator. "All aboard!" Tanezumi laughed before disappearing. We reluctantly boarded the elevator. As it went down, everyone was completely silent. It seemed like it was going down for an eternity. Finally, the elevator opened up and we all spilled out of it. Just then, everyone including myself gasped at the sight before us. There was a large arena with a cage barricading it. Between the cage and the arena, which seemed pretty high up, was a large gap that lead down to a pit of spikes. My eyes widened. _If someone were to fall off, they would surely die!_

Directly in front of the arena was a round meeting table with 21 seats, each assigned to us respectively. Tanezumi directed us all to the meeting table. Upon sitting in my chair, I looked around and noticed some of the chairs that should have been empty were filled in with cardboard cut-outs of people who were already dead. One chair had a cardboard cut-out of Remo and the other had a cardboard cut-out of Beary Nice. "What is this?!" Frank cried out when he saw the Beary Nice cut-out. "Just because they're dead doesn't mean they get to miss the death match!" She told us with a cackle. Frank put his head down. "You are truly sick!" Dennis clenched his fists. "Just then, we heard Uncle Grandpa scream. We looked up to where we heard the scream, and found Uncle Grandpa tied up and dangling over the meeting table. "LET ME DOWN FROM HERE! HELP!" he screamed frantically as he kicked his legs. "If you don't stop screaming, Old Man, I'm going to put duct tape over your mouth!" she threatened him. "You are so mean! You are really really mean! A big meanie weanie!" Uncle Grandpa complained. "I'm not going to say it again, shut it , Gramps!" Tanezumi hissed.

"Why did you tie up Uncle G?" Pizza Steve lowered his sunglasses, giving Tanezumi a rather irritated look. "Because he wanted to try and stop the death match, and I just can't let that happen!" she told us. Uncle Grandpa let out a small whimper, considering Tanezumi barred him from speaking. "Let's begin this meeting shall we?" she propped herself up on the middle of the table and cleared her throat.

"Beary Nice was found dead at 8:30 pm with three stab wounds in his abdomen and blunt force to the head." She explained to us what was on the autopsy report-like document she gave to us earlier. "One of you guys killed him!" she laughed. "Now it's time to find out who did it!" she dramatically did some sort of gymnastic flip off of the table. "Let's go over the murder weapon!" Dennis suggested to us in a bossy manner. "W-Wasn't it a knife?" Susie asked. Dennis shook his head and placed his palm against his forehead. "Do any of you pay attention?" he let out a frustrated sigh. "Ultimately, the thing that killed him was the blunt object that was struck over his head." Pizza Steve corrected Susie. "Mary, you told me and Mr. Gus about the object" he addressed me. I nodded. "Yes, it was a mini Uncle Grandpa statue." I told everyone. I heard Uncle Grandpa gasp. "Someone used a statue of me to kill one of my friends?!" he seemed devastated. "H-Hey how do you know that was the murder weapon?" Eric asked. "It could have been a cover up for something else!" he suggested to me. I thought about it for a minute before answering him. "No, it was the murder weapon, it had blood all over the base and matched the wound on Beary's head." I explained to him. "Not only that, but it wasn't found where it had originally been."

A few people gasped. "Where was it supposed to be?" Guillermo asked. I turned to Ramona. "Ramona, tell them about the detail you noticed" I instructed, but in as gentle of a manner as possible. I'm not known to be bossy. Ramona nodded. "I noticed the statue was missing from the shelf in the gift shop" she told us. "Tanezumi could have knocked it over, like she knocked all of the other Uncle Grandpa themed merchandise off of the shelves." The Fart suggested. I shook my head.  
"If Tanezumi were to have knocked it over, she would have replaced it with a statue of herself." I turned to Tanezumi who was watching us on the side lines. "Isn't that right, Tanezumi." Tanezumi giggled and nodded. "Of course! In fact, I had no idea I had missed that Uncle Grandpa statue. As soon as this death match is over I'm going to put a statue of me on the shelf!" she laughed.  
Some people in the crowd seemed to be thinking about the information given. "Okay, so we know it was on the shelf originally and was the murder weapon, but where was it hidden?" Festro asked. I turned to Dennis, who nodded in response to me. "I found it under the faux check-out counter" he told everyone. A few people nodded. "Okay, but that doesn't tell us who the murderer was," Izzie pointed out. "anybody could have gotten up to that shelf one way or another!"  
br?  
She was right. There was a stack of boxes in the immediate area of where the shelf was, anybody could have dragged them over to grab the statue. "What about the stab wounds?" Frank pointed his fingers together nervously as he looked down at the table. "I know it didn't kill Beary, but the statue couldn't have left those wounds." Everyone nodded at Frank's question. "I found a bloody pocket knife in the garbage directly in front of the gift shop." Izzie told everyone. Everyone gasped. Tiger shook her head. "The murderer wasn't thinking any of this through at all, then."

"What do you mean?" Melvin asked. "Well, in the aisle next to the freezer aisle, there was sloppily mopped up blood smeared all over the floor." Pizza Steve told us. "Not only that, but when we checked the Janitor's closet, there was a mop with blood all over it." Mr. Gus added in. "It even looked like they were trying to clean up the blood from the mop, but they didn't do a very thorough job." I added.

"It could have been anyone here then!" Melvin told us. "I mean, I don't think there's anybody here who is skilled at murdering and hiding evidence so it could have been any of us!" he continued to explain. "Not quite," Mr. Gus began. "we need to discuss everyone's alibis for 8:30. However, before we do, it would be good to note that we found a box of garbage bags in the janitor's closet."

"The same kind of garbage bag used to wrap up Beary Nice's body." Pizza Steve added. "Why would they put it in the freezer?" Guillermo asked. "I think that's the only thing the murderer thought about" Mr. Gus told us. "If he had left Beary in the same aisle he killed him in, or if he were to simply stuff him in the janitor's closet, not only would someone be able to easily tell from briefly walking through the gift shop, but the gift shop would begin to reek of corpse and someone would immediately pick up that something was wrong." he explained to us. "The killer may have not successfully cleaned up the bloody evidence properly, but with the little he did clean up and by putting Beary's body in the freezer, the killer knew that there wouldn't be that awful decomposing scent that comes with a corpse." The room fell silent. Frank began to tear up again. "Why Beary, though? What did he ever do to anyone?" he sobbed and put his head down. "Ugh I didn't come here to watch a soap opera!" Tanezumi complained. Everyone shot her a glare. "Hurry up and finish your goddamn meeting and pick 2 suckers to duke it out in the death match! My nachos are getting cold!" she hissed.

"Well, actually, that is a pretty good question. What was the killer's motive for killing Beary Nice?" I asked. Mr. Gus shook his head. "We don't have enough information to answer that. For now, it's time to discuss alibis." he told us. "At 8:30, I was cleaning up the cafeteria" he told us. "Tiny Miracle can attest to that, and so can Uncle Grandpa." he told us. "Wait a minute, Uncle Grandpa was operating the rides!" Guillermo said. Uncle Grandpa giggled. "Silly, Guillermo. I can make as many Uncle Grandpas as I need to help out all my Nephew Grandsons and Neice Granddaughters!" he explained to us. "Therefore, I can tell you with great certainty that Mr. Gus was cleaning the cafeteria at 8:30!"

Everyone nodded. "I was on the rides with Mona, Tiger, and Dingle at 8:30" Pizza Steve told us. Ramona, Tiger, and Dingle agreed with him. "Susie, Eric, and I were also on the rides at 8:30" Guillermo told all of us. Susie and Eric agreed with him, verifying his testimony. "I was playing Roll-A-Ball with Slog and The Fart" Belly Bag told us. "Yeah, I lost!" Slog giggled. "That's because you kept rolling the ball over the glass instead of under it" The Fart told him. "Oops" he pointed his fingers together and looked down, a bit ashamed of himself. Billy patted his back. "It's okay, Slog. You tried your best!" Slog smiled as Billy pat him on the back.

"Gweelok and I were in the arcade playing Mortal Kombat and other various games." Ham Sandwich announced. "Yeah, we also saw Mary there even though we told her that was our turf!" Gweelok pointed to me, sounding kind of miffed. "We didn't bother telling her to go, though, because she wasn't even playing any cool games that we wanted to play anyways!" Ham Sandwich had a hint of mockery in his voice. I just rolled my eyes in response.

"Well then, that leaves Izzie, Melvin, Dennis, and Festro with no alibis." Mr. Gus pointed out. "Wait a minute, Mr. Gus!" I interjected. "Izzie has an alibi for 8:30," I explained. "She came to the arcade and we had a brief chat at that time."

Izzie nodded. "Yeah, I decided to get out of my room for a little while" she told all of us. "Okay, then Dennis, Melvin, and Festro do not have alibis for 8:30" Mr. Gus told us.

Dennis, Melvin, and Festro all gasped in shock. "A-Are you accusing us of MURDERING someone?" Melvin asked, clearly offended. "That's bullshit! I was sleeping in my room the whole time!" Dennis told us. "Oh yeah? Well you're a liar because you gave us notes to meet you at the gift shop by 8:45!" Festro pointed a finger at him, practically shouting. "What? No I didn't!" Dennis crossed his arms. "Yeah you did! Melvin even got a note from you!" Festro continued to accuse him. "Festro, stop accusing pe-" Pizza Steve didn't have time to finish his sentence, because Melvin butted in. "Yeah! I received a note from Dennis also!" he told us.

Dennis shook his head in disbelief. "I did not write any notes to meet me in the gift shop! What are you talking about?!" he continued to deny the claim. "Alright, settle down, let's take everything one at a time right now." Mr. Gus told us. Everyone fell silent to listen to him. Mr. Gus then nodded at Festro. "Festro, do you care to tell us about the note and what you were doing from 8:30 and on?" he asked. Festro nodded. "Alright, so I received Dennis's note around 8:20 when it was slipped under my door. I stayed in my room until around 8:40, when I left to go see what he wanted at the gift shop, prepared for anything at that point." he explained to us. "I arrived at the gift shop around 8:45, and no one was there. Melvin came in shortly after me. He told me he received a note from Dennis as well. We waited a few minutes for Dennis to come, but he never showed up. We assumed it was a prank so we went back to our rooms." Dennis shook his head at the story. "I'm telling you, I did not write you a note!"

"Calm down, Dennis!" Mr. Gus held his hand out sternly. Dennis grumbled, but didn't say anything else. "Okay, so from what Festro told us, it seems Dennis might just be our culprit" Tiger tapped her chin. "W-WHAT?!" Dennis was completely taken back. "Well, it would make sense, right? Here's how you did it," Tiger began to explain. "You went to the gift shop around 8:25 shortly after Melvin left. You were getting prepared to kill Melvin or Festro, depending on who came in. You heard someone's footsteps coming into the gift shop so you hid. Beary unfortunately walked into the wrong place at the wrong time, because as soon as he came in at 8:30 you struck him over the head with the Uncle Grandpa statue that you got from standing on top of the boxes to get to the shelf. You realized you didn't kill the right target, so you had to improvise and quickly clean up your mess before Melvin and Festro came in. When they did come in, you hid yourself and snuck away back to your room so no one could find you!" Tiger ended her story with a grin. "I figured it out guys!"


	9. Chapter 8

"You moron! That doesn't make any sense!" he hissed. "How could I be in the gift shop if I was in my room the whole time?" he asked with frustration in his voice. "You weren't in your room, you were in the gift shop killing Beary!" Tiger insisted. "Hold on, Tiger." I interjected. "Dennis couldn't have killed Beary in that way." I told her. Tiger looked a bit surprised. "How could he not have?" she seemed a little irritated that I questioned her theory. "Well, not only did you leave out the part about Beary being stabbed in the abdomen, but" I turned to Melvin. "Melvin, you saw someone at 8:25 when you went into the gift shop, right?" I asked him. He nodded. "I saw Beary Nice at 8:25" he told me again like he did earlier. "Yes, so that means even if Dennis went in after 8:25, he wouldn't have killed Beary out of surprise since Beary was already in there to begin with" I told everyone. Everyone nodded, but Tiger shook her head. "He could have not noticed him at first! I mean, this was a pretty sloppily put together murder!" she refuted. "You're absolutely right about the sloppy murder, which is why Dennis couldn't have done it anyways." I explained. Dennis seemed to sigh out in relief. "Wow finally! Someone with a goddamn brain!" I ignored his commentary and continued on. "Dennis is not very tall, so he'd need to move the boxes to climb up to the shelf to get the murder weapon. However, the boxes looked untouched when I saw them."

"He could have had someone take it down for him before hand, or maybe he used an item to get it down!" Tiger pressed on. "He could have used something to get it down, but it would seem like a lot of effort for someone who sloppily put the murder together." I explained to her.

"Actually, now that I think about it, I don't think this murder was as sloppily put together as one would think." Pizza Steve interjected. "Mr. Gus, remember how you were telling us earlier that putting the body in the freezer was the only thought out thing the killer did?" he pointed to Mr. Gus as he asked. "Yes, what about it?" Mr. Gus raised his eyebrow. "If this murder was as sloppy as we're claiming it to be, why would the murderer think ahead to do that?" he seemed skeptical. "Something doesn't add up there. Honestly, now that I'm thinking about that, I do think this murder was premeditated."

"If they poorly planned the murder, then they risk themselves getting put into a death match. I feel like that would be highly unlikely." Mr. Gus shook his head. "Maybe, but it would be even riskier to murder on a whim, because you could get caught even more easily." Pizza Steve explained to us. Dennis rubbed his chin. "Actually, Pizza Steve sounds like he's getting onto something. All this time we were accusing the murderer of being sloppy, but perhaps this person was planning to murder Beary this whole time!" Dennis speculated. A few people gasped. Festro sighed. "How is that even remotely important? Whether premeditated or not, whoever killed Beary did an awful job cleaning up the evidence!"

"It's important because it ties in with the time the murder took place," Pizza Steve began to explain to us. "If the murder took place at 8:30 and the notes Melvin and Festro received were set to meet at 8:45, that could only mean whoever killed Beary did not write those notes." He crossed his arms. Ramona squealed. "My Pizza Prince is so smart~" she giggled. "Then Dennis did do it! You're the murderer!" Festro accused Dennis. "What? NO!" Dennis slapped his palms against his cheeks in frustration. "How would whoever wrote the notes know Dennis was planning to murder Beary, though?" Gweelok asked. "If they knew wouldn't they have tried to stop it themselves?"

"Perhaps the victim himself wrote the notes out before hand?" Eric speculated with a shrug. "Why would he address the sender as me then? That seems kind of stupid!" Dennis huffed as he crossed his arms. I looked at Festro and Melvin. "Do either of you have the notes in question?" I asked. Melvin shook his head, but Festro nodded and began to fish into his pocket. When he found the note he placed it in the middle of the table. Dennis immediately took it and read it. After reading it, he began to laugh. "Wow, you REALLY think I wrote these?" he asked as he turned over the letter so we could see it. "Look at this handwriting! It's so feminine and artsy!" he pointed out. I leaned in to get a better look, and sure enough the handwriting was very girly.

"T-That looks like Beary's handwriting" Frank admitted. "So Beary did write them himself?" Eric asked. I shook my head. "That wouldn't make sense, Beary ran into the gift shop around 8:15" I told everyone. "I bumped into him around that time, he told me he was getting a surprise for Frank." Izzie sighed. "It's my handwriting, guys" she told us. We were all surprised. Dennis sighed in frustration. "What the hell? Why would you write down my name?" he asked. "Well, you see, I was playin' a little prank on you guys," she giggled. "Dennis, I gave you a note from Melvin, I'm not sure how you didn't get it!" Dennis shook his head. "I saw a piece of paper on my floor this morning, but I threw it out because I thought it was something stupid from Tanezumi." he admitted. "I was asleep by 8:30 because I had a massive headache!" he told us. "Why would you want to prank us?" Festro seemed irritated. "Why not? Mildly irritating people is funny!" she giggled. "I figured when you went to the gift shop for no reason you would get frustrated for running there for nothing!" she laughed.

"Well, this information is able to rule out Izzie as the murderer, then" Pizza Steve concluded. "However, I find it strange that Melvin went earlier to the gift shop than the note specified." Pizza Steve tapped his chin. "W-What do you mean? I just wanted to make sure there was no danger!" Melvin told him. "Yeah, but you didn't have to go that early to check," Pizza Steve seemed skeptical. "I mean you coulda went 10 minutes earlier than the meeting time to check."

Melvin huffed. "Are you accusing me of MURDERING Beary Nice?" he seemed offended. "Well, I'm not saying you definitely did, but you're kind of a huge suspect right now." Pizza Steve told him. Melvin gasped. "How?! How am I a suspect?!" he tugged on his hair. "You saw Beary Nice at around 8:25 when you went to the gift shop. I told you all that this murder was most likely premeditated, but poorly planned. This means, possibly, that you could have been planning to kill someone that night, and Beary happened to be available." he nodded. Melvin gasped, almost tearing up. "Why would I plan to kill someone?!"

"I'm sure, like all of us, you want to get out of here. Maybe more so than all of us." Pizza Steve speculated. "Festro could have done it, though!" Melvin told us. Festro looked angry when he got accused. "You dare accuse me?" he tried to intimidate Melvin. "Well you said you received a note, too. For all we know you could have came in right after I left and killed Beary!"

Festro clenched his teeth. "That's such a crock of shit coming from the real culprit!" he pointed his finger at Melvin as he accused him. "I didn't kill Beary!" Melvin shouted. "I don't think it was Festro." I admitted to everyone. Everyone turned their attention to me. Melvin put his hands on his hips. "Oh really? How was it not Festro?"

"Well, I found this behind the faux counter Dennis found the murder weapon under." I pulled out the small piece of blue cloth I had found. "This was hanging on one of the nails on the wall." Everyone gasped at the evidence I presented. "This actually just might confirm it. Melvin, you killed Beary Nice" Pizza Steve accused. Melvin let out a cry. "No! That doesn't prove anything! I didn't kill Beary!" he seemed very panicked. "Your shirt color matches this small piece of cloth I found" I pointed out. Melvin began to sob. "No! It wasn't me! That's not part of my shirt!"

"You are a huge suspect right now, Melvin," I began to tell him. "That isn't my shirt! Dennis's sweater is blue! It could have been Dennis!" he accused Dennis. "For the last goddamn time, there is no way in hell it could have been me!" Dennis hissed. "I do think there is another suspect that might be even more likely than Melvin, but it's not Dennis." Everyone leaned in to listen to what I had to say. "Though this cloth matches the color of Melvin's shirt and Dennis's sweater, this cloth seems like it came from some kind of jacket lining. Look how thin it is" I told everyone as I held it out for all of them to see. "You're right." Mr. Gus confirmed as he nodded. "The only people who wear jackets are Tiger and Frank. However, Tiger couldn't have murdered Beary because she was with Pizza Steve, Ramona, and Dingle on the rides." I told them. Frank made a small whimper sound. "A-Are you saying that I-I would kill my best friend?" Frank's eyes welled up with tears. "Tiger's jacket is also kind of tight and hugs her body closer. Your jacket is long and flowy, and could easily get caught on something." I explained. Frank bit his lip. Slog seemed very upset with what I was saying. "Mary! Why are you accusing Frank of killing his best friend?"

"I'm not accusing him, I'm just wondering why he'd need to hide behind the faux check-out counter in the gift shop" I tried to sound as non-accusing as possible, but I knew there was something up with Frank's story and his supposed alibi after going over all the details. "I wasn't!" Frank tried to convince me. "May I see your jacket lining?" I asked him. Frank sighed. "Why would you need that? Clearly the cloth you are holding is from Melvin's shirt."

"Frank, it would be very important to the conclusion if you showed all of us your jacket lining." I told him. He sighed and opened up his jacket, revealing the same blue lining I was holding in my hand. "It's the same color, but that doesn't mean anything" Frank told us. "Well, it kind of does, because this would imply you were hiding behind the faux check-out counter at one point." Pizza Steve pointed out. Frank shook his head. "I was just checking to see if Beary was there when he went missing!" he told us. "I mean, I even checked the janitor's closet and found nothing! I don't know how this person was able to kill Beary without any of our knowledge that night!" he told us. "Wait a minute, Janitor's closets are usually locked unless someone has a key!" Eric pointed out. "The door opened up fine for me" Frank admitted. "How did you miss the smeared blood in the next aisle, then?" Mr. Gus raised his eyebrow. "I-I guess I overlooked it" Frank frowned. Pizza Steve shook his head. "You realize none of what you are saying adds up, right?" Frank whimpered and tapped his fingers together. "W-What are you talking about? I'm telling you the truth!"

"Only one way to find out," Pizza Steve turned to Billy. "Do you remember seeing Frank watch your roll-a-ball game?" he asked. Billy nodded. "I glanced over and saw him there around 8:15, after that I was focused on the game. He then spoke up at around 8:30 and asked if we had seen Beary." he admitted to us. "Crafty, aren't we Frank?" Pizza Steve chuckled. Frank sobbed. "W-What do you mean?" Frank's eyes welled up with more tears. "What I mean is, you could have slipped away without their knowledge between 8:15 and 8:30, and then come back to create a fake alibi for yourself." Pizza Steve took off his sunglasses to look Frank in the eye. Frank whimpered and sank in his chair. "T-That's not true! I would never think to kill Beary!" he sobbed to us. "Well, if you searched the gift shop like you said you did and found out how the Janitor's closet was able to easily be opened, you would have seen the evidence of Beary's death!" Mr. Gus pointed out. "I didn't have a lot of time to look because Izzie came to me around 9" he told me. "I would have helped you find Beary, Franky~" she told him. "I-I didn't want to burden you with my problems." he looked down. "Billy, when Frank asked about where Beary was, did he leave immediately after that question was asked?" Mr. Gus asked him. "Yes, he did. I watched him run towards the Gift Shop before going back to the game." Billy told us. "You had a full half an hour to check the Gift Shop, you would have found him before then." Mr. Gus told Frank. "Yeah, we were able to find Beary within 2 minutes of searching" Izzie told us. "I looked in other places too" Frank told us. "When I found you at 9 you were in the gift shop!" Izzie told him. Frank whimpered again. "We have our 2 culprits!" Festro shouted out.

"Finally!" Tanezumi jumped up. "You're meeting is done! Let's get o-" Tanezumi didn't have a chance to finish her sentence because Frank cried out. "No! No you don't know what you're all talking about! I can't be a suspect I would never hurt Beary!" he cried. Tanezumi let out a frustrated sigh. "Well, everyone else has decided," Pizza Steve told him before looking around at everyone else who nodded in agreement. "we're all ready to place in our decision." Frank whimpered. "Izzie, help me!" he sobbed. Izzie gave him a sad look. "I'm sorry Franky..." she closed her eyes.

Tanezumi giggled. "So, who will it be?"


	10. Chapter 9

"Melvin and Frank" Mr. Gus told Tanezumi. Frank and Melvin both cried out. "I didn't kill Beary!" Melvin insisted. Frank dropped to the ground and got into the fetal position. "No!" he began to cry again. Tanezumi rolled her eyes. "Hurry up and get your butts over here! You need to choose your weapon!"

Melvin and Frank refused to move. "If you don't come, I'll execute both of you!" she threatened. They both immediately went over to where she was asking them to go. Tanezumi motioned for us to sit in what looked like a set of bleachers. We reluctantly shuffled over and sat down on the seats. We watched Melvin pick up a futuristic looking sword and Frank pick up a spiked medieval mace. "Nice choices!" Tanezumi complimented. "Now get your stupid asses into the ring!" she motioned for them to get into an elevator that would bring them up to the arena. Once they got in, Tanezumi hopped onto the bleachers with us. She clapped and before we knew it the bleachers shot up into the air. Everyone let out a startled scream. The bleacher finally stopped going up, and when we looked to see what had happened, we were very high above the ground. I heard Slog gulp. "T-That's really high..." he held onto Billy. "That's to ensure you don't try to leave during the fight" she told us. "I don't wanna watch this, though!" Guillermo complained. "I'm scared!" Susie sobbed. "Too bad!" Tanezumi laughed.

Melvin and Frank stepped out of the elevator and went onto the arena. Once they stepped on the arena, a large screen TV hovering over the arena turned on. It gave us sitting in the bleachers a closer look at the fight that was about to take place. Tanezumi pulled out a microphone from what seemed like no where and proceeded to speak into it. "The rules of the Death Match are very simple. Kill your opponent!" she giggled. "Your fight starts now!"

A bell rung, signifying the beginning of the fight. Melvin and Frank stood there looking at each other, fumbling with their weapons. They continued to stand there and look at each other, clearly not wanting to fight at all. Tanezumi rolled her eyes. "FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!" she began to chant. Everyone at the bleachers silently watched the big screen. Frank tightly squeezed his weapon before giving Melvin a glare. "You killed Beary! I will destroy you!" he hissed. "I didn't kill Beary!" Melvin pleaded. Frank ran at him with the mace, striking down at him once he got over to him. Melvin held up his sword to block the blow from the mace. They stood there, Frank struggling to strike his mace down on Melvin and Melvin struggling to keep the mace away from him. Finally Melvin let out a cry and pushed Frank back with his foot. "I didn't kill Beary!" he shouted as he charged at Frank with the sword. Frank and Melvin proceeded to have a classical sword fight with their strange weapons. The weapon fight went on for a while. I felt Susie clutch onto my arm and bury her face into my shoulder. I tried comforting her by patting her head. After a rigorous fight, Melvin and Frank stood back in an effort to catch their breath. Their chests heaved as they had their hands on their knees.

Frank then got up and went to strike at Melvin again. Melvin brought up his sword in defense and knocked the mace right out of Frank's hand. "O-Oh dear..." Frank gulped. Melvin to this opportunity to swing his sword at the now defenseless Frank. Frank dodged the attack and tried his best to get his weapon. Melvin went at him, holding the sword up ready to strike down any minute. Frank continued to crawl himself toward his weapon, keeping a good eye on Melvin. Melvin ran to attack. Frank was by the edge of the arena now, almost retrieving his weapon. Melvin let out a warrior cry as he began to strike down at Frank. In the blink of an eye, Frank grabbed his weapon and spun himself around. He gave Melvin a swift sweep-kick, causing Melvin to lose balance, drop his sword, and hurtle off the edge of the arena. Melvin screamed as he plummeted down. We all watched in horror as Melvin fell face up on one of the spears at the bottom, which impaled him right through his chest. He let out a pained gasp before instantly dying. Some of the people on the bleachers screamed in sheer terror, including myself. Tanezumi laughed and clapped. "Good fight! Good fight!" she cackled. "W-Was he the murderer?" Festro asked, his eyes wide from terror from the sight he had just witnessed. Tanezumi laughed. "Nope!"

We all gasped. "W-Who was it then? Was it Frank or did we pick the wrong people?" Pizza Steve seemed a bit panicked as he tugged on his hair. "You picked the right person, it was Frank!" she cackled. Frank let out a whimper as confetti fell from the top of the arena. More gasps ensued. I couldn't believe it, my suspicions were right!

"F-Frank? How could you?!" Billy was absolutely disgusted. "C'mon, Frank, tell em why you did it!" Tanezumi giggled. Frank whimpered as a small hole appeared in the middle of the arena. From the hole came up a microphone that he could speak into. He gulped as he went up to it. "W-Well I-" he shut his eyes for a moment. "Was he REALLY the killer, or are you lying to us?" Slog asked Tanezumi. Before Tanezumi could answer, Frank's eyes snapped open with rage. "I did it because not only do I want to be one step closer to getting out of here, but when I do get out of here I don't want to be forced into anymore humiliating and painful situations because of that tiny little bastard!" he clenched his teeth and fists as he looked down. "That asshole always encouraged me to try new things," he sounded a bit thoughtful when he said this. He then snapped back up with an angry look on his face. "AND FOR WHAT? Pain, suffering, humiliation, and embarrassment!" he began to cry. "It's not like he even cared about how I felt, either. Every single time he'd drag me into trying a new experience, every single time I got hurt, every single time I was humiliated, he just didn't seem to care!" Frank shoved his hands into his pocket. "I remember one day, when he wanted us to try climbing trees," he closed his eyes as he reminisced. "I never climbed a tree before, and I really didn't want to try because I knew in my heart something bad was going to happen. He kept encouraging me, pointing to the metal tower I was standing next to, encouraging me to practice on that while he climbed the tree. I decided to just go on with it and I practiced climbing the metal tower. As I got up to the top, however, a large bird swooped down on me and carried me away. I ended up in the large bird's nest, practically getting pecked to death by its babies. I looked up and saw Beary giggling and shaking his head." Frank shut his eyes with an irritated expression on his face. "He told me 'That's what I call a new experience!' as I was getting pecked to death and screaming in agony. I tilted my head back, ready to welcome my death and saw that the tower I had been climbing was an electrical tower that was extremely high-voltage at the top." Frank opened his tear-filled eyes. "I realized at that moment that he was trying to kill me then. He had genuinely been trying to kill me on every new experience we ever had together. Our friendship was a lie. Everything was a lie." he sobbed angrily. "That's why I murdered him here."

Everyone was silent as we listened to his story. I felt absolutely terrible for Frank. The experience he just shared with us sounded awful. I knew there was something off about Beary Nice, but I had no idea Beary Nice was a psychopath like that. "I could have gotten away with it too if part of my jacket lining hadn't been left on the nail." he sighed. "You see, after Melvin left the gift shop at around 8:25 I snuck away from the Roll-A-Ball game and went in there myself because I knew Beary was in there. I was planning on killing him ever since Tanezumi announced that we had to kill each other in order to get out of here. I knew that right then and there was my chance, so I took a pocket knife from one of the shelves and went over the plan I had for killing him in the gift shop earlier that day. He was surprised to see me in the gift shop, so I let him come over to the aisle I needed him to stand in before making my move. Once he went to the aisle, I stabbed him three times in the abdomen in hopes he would suffer and die just like I suffered and almost died when I was getting pecked to death in that nest before I was taken to a hospital by nearby park visitors. He was still alive, holding onto his stab wounds. At this point he was trying to gurgle out something, but I didn't care. I walked over to the shelf that had the Uncle Grandpa statue on it and bashed him over the head. I knew I had to make an alibi for myself so I wouldn't get questioned later, so I put down the weapon next to him, hid my hands, and ran out to the Roll-A-Ball game I previously attended." he giggled and smiled. "I asked Billy, Slog, and The Fart where Beary was like as if I was standing there the whole time. They all shrugged, so I ran off to finish cleaning up Beary's dead corpse. I put Beary's body into a garbage bag and stuffed it in the freezer, knowing that if I hadn't, people would notice the smell of decay if they went in there later on. Once I stuffed his body in the freezer, I went to the janitor's closet and took out a mop. I wet it and began to mop off the trail of blood and the bloody pool he left in the aisle I killed him in. Just as I was cleaning, I heard Festro's voice outside of the gift shop. I panicked, took the statue, and hid behind the check-out counter. Festro came in and stood around looking at his watch. Melvin came in shortly after Festro and they sat and discussed how they had gotten a note from Dennis. I was really angry that they were lounging around in here, because I couldn't finish executing my plan. They finally decided to leave after a while, luckily not bothering to look around the gift shop. I put the statue in one of the cubby-holes and went right to work with cleaning again. I tried to hurry because I wasn't sure if there would be another distraction. I needed to wet the mop a bit more, so I went into the janitor's closet to do so. Just then, I heard Izzie call for me. I quickly washed any blood I had on my hands and hid the bloody pocket knife from her sight before going to greet her. She asked me to hang out with her, and before I could tell her I would catch up with her later she began to drag me off. I threw the pocket knife in the trash while she dragged me out. I was hoping to return later to finish executing my plan, but the park closed and I wasn't able to get back into the gift shop." he sighed. "That's how I killed Beary, but apparently the killers who win in the death match get a special surprise." he smiled.  
Tanezumi laughed. "You're right, Frank, you DO get a special surprise." Frank smiled, his eyes twinkling. "I bet it's granting me permission right out of here!" Frank was hopeful. Tanezumi laughed obnoxiously at him. "Really? You of all people should know to always expect the worst!" she told him. His smile faded. "W-What do you mean?" he asked. "You're special surprise is a brutal execution designed just for you!" she cackled. Frank sighed. "I should have seen that coming..." he shut his eyes tightly and sobbed. "Now I wish I let Melvin kill me" tears rolled down his cheek.

"Any last words before we get on with the execution?" she asked. He sobbed and turned to the bleachers. "I-Izzie, even if you screwed up my murder plans, you have been the only person I've ever met to show me kindness in the brief time we did meet."  
Izzie began to tear up. "F-Franky..." she sobbed. Tanezumi rolled her eyes. "Ugh let's get on with the execution before this turns into a puke fest!" she made a gagging noise. "Wait! Before I go..." Frank took off his jacket and a necklace he was wearing. "Izzie, these are for you. I want you to have them. Never forget me, okay?"

Tanezumi appeared on the stage and picked up the things Frank wanted to give to Izzie. She then reappeared on the bleachers and handed them to Izzie. Tears rolled down Izzie's cheek as she held on tightly to the necklace and hugged onto the jacket.

"It's execution time!" Tanezumi laughed as she pulled out a remote and pressed a button.


	11. Summertime Cookout

✖✗✘ ✘✗✖

_Frank was tied onto a large metal skewer that was held up by two big tower-like contraptions. These contraptions rotated the skewer over a blazing fire. Frank shut his eyes tightly as he was spun around the fire for a bit. He was then stabbed by a giant two-pronged fork that released him from the ties that held him onto the skewer and transported him to a large grill. The skewer placed him lying on his back onto a large heated grill. He screamed as he was being cooked alive. The skewer stabbed him again and flipped him over so that he was lying on his stomach. A large spatula came down and pressed his body into the grill. The skewer stabbed into his back and transported his now dead body over to a large hot dog bun and placed him down in between the bun. Tanezumi came over with a ketchup bottle and a mustard bottle and began to squeeze it all over Frank's corpse. She laughed as a big sign came down behind her that said "HOT DOGS, GET YOUR HOT DOGS"_


	12. Chapter 10

We all stood in shock over the scene we had just witnessed. Izzie let out a loud shriek as she dropped down to her knees. "NO NO NO NO!" she cried as she slammed her fists on the ground. "FRANKY!" she sobbed, clutching onto his jacket. Tanezumi cackled. "Such a marvelous ending to a good death match!" she chirped happily. "You're a sick freak!" Pizza Steve yelled out at Tanezumi. The pink rat just smiled. "Oh thank you for noticing, Steve-o" she giggled as she pushed a button on a remote control that made the bleachers travel back down to the ground. There we saw Uncle Grandpa tied up over the meeting table still. "WHAT DID I MISS?!" he cried out as he asked, desperately trying to free himself. "Melvin and Frank are dead..." Billy told him with a glum tone. "NOOOOOOO" Uncle Grandpa began to kick around furiously. "NO NO THAT'S NOT POSSIBLE! WHY?" his eyes filled up with tears. "Shut up old man!" Tanezumi snapped at him. "No!" Billy piped up angrily. "You shut up, let Uncle Grandpa go!"

Tanezumi cackled at Billy's sudden outburst. "You don't tell me what to do! That's my job!" she waved at us. "Be gone, all of you! Go enjoy the rest of your day because it's going to be dinner time soon!" she cackled. Uncle Grandpa continued to sob and kick around. _Enjoy? She's so insensitive. Two of our friends are dead and she has the nerve to tell us to enjoy ourselves?_ I looked over at Billy. He seemed really on edge about everything that just happened. Slog put his hand on his shoulder. "Billy, there's nothing else we can do. We should just leave like she told us to" he frowned. The pink haired boy sighed. "You're probably right..."

We all trudged over to the elevator and let it take us back up to the hotel courtyard. "We should all head to the cafeteria for a group meeting" Mr. Gus suggested to everyone, though the suggestion sounded more like an instruction than anything. The rest of the ride up was silent as the elevator felt like it was taking forever to get to its destination. It finally opened up and we all dispersed out of the elevator and trudged on to the cafeteria, where we all sat down. Seeing three empty seats at the table seemed to induce more despair in the atmosphere. All I wanted to do was lock myself in my room at this point. The fact this is all very real is still a very hard pill for me to swallow, and I just don't want to deal with it anymore. Everyone was in complete silence. _There isn't anything to discuss, why even bother meeting up here?_

Finally, Mr. Gus spoke up. "Alright, I wanted us all here, because from now on I want to make sure that absolutely positively no one gets murdered again" he told us. Pizza Steve began to laugh. "Are you shitting me right now?" he shook his head. "You actually think you can prevent people from murdering others?" he began to cackle. "Yeah, Mr. Gus, I think you're being a bit too hopeful" Billy suggested as he raised his eyebrow. "A bit? It's too hopeful! That hope will get YOU killed, you dum-dum!" Pizza Steve's tone became a bit more serious and bitter.

"Just hear me out, guys-" Mr. Gus began to speak. Unfortunately, that fell on deaf ears. "What we learned from the deaths of Beary, Melvin, and Frank is that nobody can be trusted! Not even our closest friends!" Pizza Steve reminded him in that bitter tone. The bitterness in his voice did not sound like his usual tone, and it made me kind of nervous. "The pizza dude is right!" Festro added in. "Beary and Frank were best friends, and the minute Frank came here he plotted out his death!"

Mr. Gus shook his head. "Just listen to-" again, anything he said fell on deaf ears. "Blugh blegh blugh blugh?" Dingle spoke his gibberish in a concerned voice. Festro nodded. "I love you, Dingle, but I don't even think we can trust each other!" he admitted. Everyone gasped. "F-Festro you don't trust me either? I thought I was your friend!" Slog seemed offended. "How do I know one of yous isn't planning out my death as we speak!" he pointed fingers at everyone. "For once I agree with the purple moron" Pizza Steve sighed. "Any one of us could be plotting the death of any person in this room"

Ramona got up and slammed her hands on the table. "My Prince! I would never plot your death!" she told him honestly. He raised an eyebrow at her. "Oh?" his tone was still out of the ordinary for him. "What proof would you have of that?" Ramona's eyes widened as she gasped. "I-I..." she began to tear up. Pizza Steve got up. "Alright I had enough of this. I can't trust any of you. I don't want to die." He began to walk away but Mr. Gus slammed his hands on the table and yelled. "STEVE, GET BACK HERE RIGHT NOW!"

Steve immediately turned around and faced him. Mr. Gus angrily looked at the rest of us. "You all listen to me right now!" he was definitely angry. "If you would all just let me talk, maybe we can come to a solution to our problems rather than having this attitude we're all having right now!" Steve shook his head. "Please, enlighten me Gus. What is your plan to prevent future murders." he asked. "My plan is to make stricter meeting times throughout the day!" he began to tell us. "We should also travel in groups of 3 at all times, with the exception of going to the bathroom or going to your room" he told us. "That actually could work!" Gweelok noddeed. Steve chuckled. "There's 17 of us, if we split into groups of 3 there will be one group that is a group of 2. That would be considerably dangerous for the group of 2, because one person can murder the other without any witnesses." he explained. "Also, what if in a group of 3 there is an accomplice to a murder? Your plan wouldn't work."

"You didn't let me finish, There will be groups of 3, but two groups will have 4 people in it. As for accomplices, that wouldn't really be that smart of an idea, because a murder accomplice could rat their partner out for their own gain. There can only be one murderer, so an accomplice can rat out their partner and get away with it, continuously flying under the radar helping people murder each other until they are the last ones left. So murder accomplice would be a dumb idea to begin with" Mr. Gus rebuked Steve. "You can't entirely rule that out, though, because what if that was someone's plan all along?" Steve grinned. "Now tell me about these stricter meeting times" his voice was still bitter and calm. "Well not only will we meet for breakfast, lunch, and dinner," Mr. Gus began. "but we should also meet in between those times to make sure everyone is okay."  
Steve shook his head. "I don't buy it. Stricter meeting times and 'buddy systems' aren't going to stop any murders from taking place." he began to walk away again. "Count me out. I'm not letting you all kill me."

Mr. Gus sighed as he watched him walk away. There was something about Pizza Steve's behavior that just didn't quite sit well with me. His speech pattern, his tone, and his whole demeanor just changed and it felt like he was a completely different person. "Well that rules one person out, is everyone else cool with the plan?" he looked around at us. Festro shook his head. "Nuh uh! I'm with Pizza Dude! You all are crazy killers and traitors I want nothing to do with that!" he got up. "Festro!" The Fart called out to him in a disappointed tone. "No, Fart, I'm done!" he told him as he followed after Pizza Steve. Mr. Gus looked at us. "Anyone else thinking of not attending?"

Everyone shook their heads. Mr. Gus looked over at Dennis. "You sure you don't wanna follow after them?" he asked. Dennis laughed. "Oh what? Because I was in my room the whole time yesterday when the same exact fight happened?" he rolled his eyes. "When I did that I almost became a murder suspect! I've learned my lesson, I'll try out your kumbaya group idea" he gave a sarcastic chuckle. Gus nodded. "Well, now we'll have even groups of 3, so let's go ahead and make the groups."

Ramona stood up. "Well, if my prince does not wish to participate in these festivities, I will choose Dingle!" she told us. "You gotta pick ano-" Mr. Gus was cut short when Gweelok and Ham Sandwich shouted. "WE'RE GONNA PARTNER UP!" as they high fived each other. Slog tackle hugged Billy. "I FOUND MY PARTNER!" he chirped. Mr. Gus sighed. "Guys you need to pick another person to be in your group!" he told them. "Well, we wanted to be together in a group of three!" Guillermo pointed at Eric and Susie. Ramona stomped her foot. "No Susie shall join us!"

Susie gulped. "W-Why me?" Ramona pointed at her in an almost authoritative way. "You! You seem very nice and I would like to engage in many conversations with you!" the disgustoid lady told Susie. _Ramona is pretty awkward socially, even for a disgustoid._ Susie giggled. "Oh uh, me? O-Okay! You seem nice too I guess" she giggled and grinned. "Aww what, but I wanted to be in a group with you!" Guillermo looked upset. "Guillermo you can join us!" Slog smiled, still holding onto Billy. "We are the coolest!" the messy-haired boy laughed. "We'll be sure to visit Ramona's group often so you can hang out with Susie too!" Billy reassured Guillermo. "Oh, alright, I guess I can do that..."

"Hey what about me?" Eric asked. "Well, I already know who I want in my group, and that is Izzie and Mary" Dennis told us. I gasped. "M-Me?" I was a bit confused. "You are one of the smartest ones here, Mary." he told me. "And I need to keep an eye on Izzie, with those note pranks she pulled earlier!" he hissed. Izzie would probably have giggled mischiviously at this, but she was hugging onto Frank's jacket and staring into space. "She also seems pretty upset, so we should take good care of her" I suggested to Dennis. "Yeah, that too..." he huffed.

"Well I want the two most responsible people here in my group..." Mr. Gus told us. "So I pick Tiger and The Fart to be in my group" Tiger jumped up happily. "Yeah!" she giggled. Fart also seemed very happy. "Oh my, you think I am responsible? I am honored" he blushed. "Looks like Eric is stuck with Ham and Gweelok!" Slog pointed out. Ham and Gweelok sighed. "Ugh do you even play video games?" Ham Sandwich had a snooty tone in his voice. Eric sighed. "Aww man..." he shuffled his feet. "Dinner time is going to begin in a half an hour, perhaps we should just spend the rest of the time setting up?" Fart asked. "Agreed, does one group want to go tell Steve and Festro that dinner will be ready soon?" Mr. Gus asked as he looked around at all of us. "We'll go!" I told him as I stood up. Dennis nodded. "Yeah, I wanna walk around a bit and calm my nerves anyways." he admitted before turning to Izzie. "C'mon Izzie!"

Izzie responded by burying herself in Frank's jacket. "I don't want to" she told us. "Izzie, c'mon! We are a group!" he insisted, but she stood her ground. "No." she lightly sobbed under the jacket. "Izzie..." he got a bit frustrated. Just then, Ramona stood up. "I know I am not part of your group, but may I accompany you if Izzie does not wish to go? I would like to convince the Prince to join us!" she stood in an almost formal looking stance, like one you would see someone make when addressing someone of royalty. "Well, if Izzie doesn't want to go, I don't see a problem." I shrugged. "I'll let this slide for now but next time Izzie must go with you guys!" Mr. Gus told us. "Now go get those two" he waved at us. We nodded and went on our way. Dennis was rather quiet throughout our walk back to the hotel. He did some stress-reducing breathing exercises as we were on our way. I decided to let him de-stress himself and talked to Ramona instead.

"So, Ramona, how come you refer to Steve as your prince?" I asked her. She giggled. "He's dreamy like a prince~" she squealed as her tongue hung out. I giggled. "Well, he is kinda cute now that you mention it, but is that really all?" I asked. "He is my prince because he is very kind to me!" she began to explain. "He tells me all about his achievements in the human world as a royal prince and also tells me alot about how the human world works!" she gushed. _If one things for sure, Steve is not actually a prince, and the information he is telling her are probably just alot of tall tales to make himself look cooler_. "He also told me that he thought I was cool and doesn't judge me for the fact that I am a disgustoid" she squealed again. _That's awful nice of him._ "He is true royalty! Even if sometimes he acts up like the way he did in the cafeteria earlier. He doesn't mean it, though." she explained. Her last point was the most interesting to me. "You mean this isn't the first time he's 'acted up'?" I asked. "Not at all! He gets grumpy and serious from time to time. Sometimes he gets a little too obsessed with fire. Sometimes he's louder than usual. Heck, sometimes he thinks he's in a death metal band and will play wondrous guitar solos on his electric guitar!" she giggled. "He is quite a fascinating prince! Mr. Gus, Billy, and Tiger can even verify that information for you. However, sometimes he will without warning disappear for periods of time. That worries me. I hope he isn't trying to do that now." she sighed. "I hope not" I responded. _Huh, so Steve has a history of erratic behavior. I mean, I know after the events that just took place anyone would be upset and react pretty bitterly. However, he took an extreme leap in views about the whole situation in such a short period of time, not to mention the way he spoke didn't seem anything like the Pizza Steve I was introduced to a few days ago. Then again, I don't know much about the guy to really even know for sure._

We arrived at the hotel and went up the stairs to the rooms. Ramona immediately went up to Pizza Steve's door and knocked. "Pizza Prince~" she called out in a sing-songy voice. "Dinner is being prepared and will be ready very soon. Please join us, my Prince!"  
Steve slightly opened the door to peek through at us. "Dinner? Wha-?" he looked genuinely confused. "Wasn't it just morning?" he asked. Ramona giggled. "Silly Prince! It is almost dinner time!"

"Where did the day go?" he scratched his head. "Dude, seriously? We spent the whole day performing investigations and watching death matches!" Dennis shook his head. "Uh..." Steve slowly nodded. "Yeahh... uh yeah?"

"Frank, Melvin, and Beary died! Did you forget already?" Dennis stamped his foot in frustration. "I know... I-I didn't forget..." Steve gave us all a blank look. He didn't sound too sure in his statement. Everything was silent between us for a moment. "Well, my prince, will you join us for dinner?" Ramona asked. "Yeah sure thing, 'Mona!" he smirked and came out of his room, shutting the door behind him. His demeanor completely changed from before. He was literally back to the person I had met a few days ago. "Hey Steve, are you feeling okay?" I asked him. "I feel like a million bucks, as usual" he gave me a sly grin with his usual arrogant attitude. "Why do you ask?"

I shook my head. "N-Nothing, let's just get Festro" I said as I went over to Festro's door and knocked. "Hey, Festro, dinner is going to be ready soon, are you coming?" I asked. "Dinner?" Festro asked before peeking through the door and eying us all suspiciously. "Are you sure? Or are you trying to trick me into your kumbaya circle?"

"Dinner is literally going to be served soon, are you in or not?" Dennis asked him impatiently. "Alright, alright!" Festro sighed and left his room, shutting the door behind him and joining our group. "I'm only coming for dinner though! That's it!" he told us before noticing Pizza Steve there. "Oh, you couldn't resist dinner either could you?" he smirked.

Steve shrugged. "I am kinda hungry I guess..." Festro laughed as we went on our way. "Even the people who are most adamant on locking themselves in their room come to get food eventually!"

Steve tilted his head. "Uhh..." Steve looked genuinely lost by Festro's comment. Festro sighed as we exited the hotel. "Dude, you were tellin' all of us how we couldn't trust anyone from all the events that happened and you stormed off to your room and shit. I didn't think you'd ever come out even for food!" he explained. Steve still looked lost. "Dude, you were the one telling us how everyone could be a traitor..." Steve reminded him. Festro let out a frustrated sigh. "Dude that was yesterday!" Steve laughed. "Wow yeah okay dude!" he chuckled as he circled his finger around his ear to signify he thought Festro was crazy. _Does he seriously not remember what happened?_ Festro was ready to retort back but Ramona broke the conversation. "My Prince, now that you have decided to join us for dinner, do you think you will join our groups?" she asked. "Groups? What groups?" Steve again looked totally lost. "You know, the groups Mr. Gus was talking about!" Ramona reminded him. "Oh uh, yeah sure cool!" he told her as he rubbed his head. _Is he messing with us?_

We arrived in the cafeteria where we saw Fart and Gus finish handing out neatly organized trays to everyone as they all got in line. Tiny Miracle came out doing his weird little robot dance and began to ask everyone what they wanted to eat. Mr. Gus saw us arrive and grinned. "Steve! Festro! So glad you decided to join us" Steve laughed and gave Mr. Gus a friendly punch on the arm. "Yo MG of course Pizza Steve is gonna join dinner time! It would suck without me, anyways!" he laughed. Gus shook his head. "Steve, you really are something else! From the way you were acting before it looked like you didn't ever want to interact with us again!"

Steve had that same confused look on his face before laughing. "Woah dude! I was totally messin' with you man! You all fell for it! I'm good!" he laughed as he took his tray and got in line. Ramona laughed and followed him. "You were joking the whole time?" she giggled. "You got me worried!" Festro shook his head. "Dude that joke was kinda harsh though..."

Mr. Gus sighed and shook his head. "Don't do that ever again!" he looked serious. Steve chuckled. "Aight man, we're cool I won't play too many pranks on ya!" he lightly elbowed him with a grin. We all sat down for dinner, which was kind of a silent one. Even though we came up with plans and initiatives earlier, we were still upset about the death of our friends Beary, Frank, and Melvin. Izzie didn't even touch her food as she kept herself covered in Frank's jacket. After Dinner, we decided to retreat early and go to our rooms. As I made my way to my room, I overheard Steve speaking to Ramona. "Yo, 'Mona. It's early I don't wanna go in my room yet, let's hang at the arcade!"

Ramona shook her head. "My Prince, I would love to engage in video gaming activities with you, but the Gus Man told us we must travel in groups and I cannot travel with you unless the rest of my group is present! And they do not wish to go anywhere right now" she told him. "Aww man... can I hang out in your room then? Or you can hang out in mine whatever I just don't really wanna go to sleep so early and there's nothing that entertaining to do in the rooms" he asked. "Yes! We can do that!" she told him as she invited him into her room. I widened my eyes. Normally, I wouldn't think much of the situation, considering I don't personally care for other people's romantic affairs. However, with the way Pizza Steve has been acting, I couldn't help but feel like Ramona was in some kind of danger. I hope he wouldn't do anything like murder her, but if he has a pattern of erratic behavior, he could snap any minute. I decided to keep an ear out for them as I went into my room. I washed up in the bathroom and put some pajamas on. Before I went to bed, I put my ear up to the wall to see if I could hear Pizza Steve and Ramona in the next room. I heard their voices faintly speaking. I'm not sure what they were talking about, but they seemed to be having a discussion of some sort. I was ready to turn around and get into my bed when suddenly I heard Ramona squeal in fright. My eyes widened as I pressed my ear against the wall to see if I could hear anything else. I heard a bunch of crashing and thrashing as Ramona kept squealing in fright. I heard Pizza Steve yell a few times too. I instantly became worried.

**_Was he murdering her?_**


	13. Intermission 2

Voice:_He's... He's gone... Nowhere to be found... Impossible... This cannot be happening... we're all in danger... I have to alert the others..._

_I hope they listen to me..._

**❀ ✿ TANEZUMI'S TALK SHOW ✿ ❀ **  
(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ～『✧~*_I knew this guy who knew this guy who knew this guy who knew this guy who knew this INHUMAN PIECE OF SHIT who liked to put KETCHUP and MUSTARD on his PANCAKES! WHO THE HELL PUTS __**KETCHUP**__ ON THEIR __**PANCAKES**__? WHO THE HELL PUTS __**MUSTARD**__ ON THEIR __**PANCAKES**__? That is absolutely disgusting! Don't even talk to me and don't even look at me if you put ketchup and mustard on you __**goddamn pancakes, you sick freak!**_ ~(⊙ω⊙✿)』


	14. Chapter 11

I immediately left my room and quickly began to bang on Ramona's door. "Ramona? Ramona are you okay?" I continued to knock. Tiger, who's room was across from Ramona's, opened her door and looked at me with a confused look. "Mary? What are you doing?" she asked. "Ramona let Steve in her room and now she's screaming and I don't know what's going on!" I said worried as I continued to knock on the door. Gweelok, who's room was next to Ramona's, came out of his room and rolled his eyes at me. "Mary, leave them alone! It's clear what they are doing!" he told me before he banged on the door. "KEEP IT DOWN IN THERE! NO ONE WANTS TO HEAR THAT!" he yelled at them. Tiger began to laugh. "Mary!" she giggled. "You didn't know?"

I shook my head. "I-I don't think tha-" Tiger put her arm around me. "Just ignore them, go to sleep." I shook my head again. "But there's a video camera an-" suddenly Ramona's door flew open and Ramona was standing there panicked. "HELP PLEASE!" she shrieked. Tiger's smile faded as her eyes widened. Gweelok also became concerned. We all ran into the room to see what all the ruckus was about. Ramona was up on the table screeching as Pizza Steve was armed with a chair trying to back something into the corner. "Don't worry 'Mona I got this!" he reassured her. We looked to see what he was trying to corner and it was a giant cockroach looking bug! Steve hesitated for a few seconds before throwing the chair at the bug. The bug skirted away and darted at him, which caused Pizza Steve to shriek and jump up on the table with Ramona. "Holy shit!" Steve held onto Ramona. Ramona hugged onto him. "Oh man that bug is nasty!" she cried. "Yeah and it's trying to eat my delicious pizza skin!"

A few more people came in to see what all the commotion was. Mr. Gus was one of the people that came in. He saw the bug in the corner and sighed. "Really? All this over a stupid bug?" he asked. "AWWW THAT KITTY! IT'S SO CUTE!" I heard Slog's voice gush. "Slog, that's a cockroach!" Billy sighed. "It is? I thought that was a cat!" Slog seemed genuinely perplexed by the realization that what he was viewing was not a cat. Mr. Gus went over to the cockroach and stomped on it, instantly killing it. "Aww poor cock-a-rooch" Slog seemed disappointed. Mr. Gus turned and faced Ramona and Steve who were cowering on the table. "Oh uh. I was just going to do that! I was trying to super charge my ultimate Italian Karate Stomp!" he played off his cowardice. "Yeah... sure..." Mr. Gus sighed. "Can we all go to bed now?"

"Just get that thing out of my room!" Ramona screeched. Slog picked up the dead roach and sniffled. "I will give you a proper toilet funeral!" he whispered to it before exiting the room. Everyone else began to exit the room and go back to their own rooms.  
As I went back to my room, I chuckled at myself. _Mary, I can't believe you thought a murder was taking place! Don't be silly!_ I went back into my room and crawled into bed. It was apparent the whole amusement park events had gotten to me, and I definitely needed a little bit of rest. I closed my eyes and tried to relax my muscles. Before I knew it I fell asleep.

The next morning, the same Tanezumi announcement woke me up. I opened my eyes to see the same ugly pink rat wearing stereotypical newscaster hair. "Get up, little shits! The amusement park is now open! Enjoy the festivities of the day before our closing time!"  
I groaned and rubbed my head. I still was not used to this schedule. I freshened up and got myself ready for the day before exiting my room. I made my way out of the hotel and to the cafeteria. When everyone arrived, Mr. Gus did a headcount of everybody to make sure everyone was there. He smiled and nodded when he found everyone that was supposed to be there was there. "Perfect! We're all here"

Steve yawned and slumped over the table. Festro gave him a smirk. "Huhhuh I heard you and Ramona last night" Festro gave Steve an eyebrow waggle.

Ramona sighed. "I'm sorry we were loud... we could not help it"

Festro laughed. "Wow you're not even trying to pretend like you didn't do it! That's just great!"

Steve raised his eyebrow. "What are you suggesting here?"

"Well... you guys... did it" Festro tried to hint without actually saying it.

Steve and Ramona burst out laughing. So did everyone else who witnessed the spectacle last night.

"Dude, get your head out of the gutter! There was a crazy man-eating bug in her room that we were trying to kill!" Steve laughed.

Slog looked down sadly. "That poor cock-a-rooch."

Billy pat his back. "It's okay, Slog"

"Oh... that's what that was all about" Festro looked a bit disappointed. He then became skeptical again and asked "What were you even doing in her room in the first place?"

"We were talking about stuff" Pizza Steve shrugged.

"Yes! Many wonderful things such as a very engaging discussion on the important issues of Grape Juice!" Ramona told us as she stood up in a powerful stance like as if she was ready to give a speech.

Billy gave Steve a look. "Really? Grape Juice, Steve?"

"Alright, enough of that, let's go over today's agenda!" Fart instructed us as he tapped a pen against a clipboard he was holding.

Everyone fell silent to listen to what he had to say. "While we were heading back to our rooms last night, I couldn't help but notice the gate that was locked before was now unlocked! I wanted to check it out last night, but everyone seemed so tired and upset that I didn't want to be pushy. I checked to make sure it was still open today, and sure enough it is!"

Everyone nodded, waiting for him to go on. "So I propose that after breakfast we should all go explore what is on the other side of the gate! After some exploring, we should all meet back in the cafeteria around brunch time to discuss our findings!" Fart suggested.

Mr. Gus nodded before adding in. "Very good idea, but remember we all have to travel with our groups!" he then looked over at Steve and Festro. "Which reminds me, y'all don't have a group!"

Ramona held her hand out. "My Prince has a group! He will join Dingle, Susie, and I!" she told him. "What about you, Festro?" Mr. Gus asked the purple disgustoid.

"Hmm..." Festro looked around. Everyone seemed reluctant on having him join. Slog then spoke up. "Festro, you can join my group!" he smiled. Billy and Guillermo groaned. Slog turned to his group with a stern look. "Hey! Don't be like that!"

"I can't help it, he's kind of been an asshole the whole time and I'm not sure I wanna deal with that" Billy admitted. Festro didn't seem to like that comment to much, but didn't really say anything.

"I know Festro can be a little much sometimes, but he is one of my good friends and I promise that he's not as bad as he wants you to think he is" he reassured.

"Thank you, Slog" Festro gave Slog a smirk. "What are bros for?" Slog smiled back at him.

"Alright, now that that's settled, let's eat breakfast and then explore!" Mr. Gus instructed. We all got ourselves the nice breakfast Tiny Miracle served us. Breakfast was a bit depressing at first, but it began to pick up as Slog and Guillermo threw out suggestions on what we should talk about to change the mood to a more upbeat one.

After breakfast, we assembled into our groups and headed out toward the now opened gate. beyond the gate were several buildings. It looked like the resort part of the hotel. There was a building with a large medical cross on it, a building with a picture of a barbell on it, a building with a picture of a palm tree on it, and a building with a picture of a book on it. Izzie squealed when she saw the building with the medical cross on it. "Is THAT what I think it is?" she exclaimed her question.

"I-" I didn't have much time to answer her as she dragged us toward the building. When we got inside, it turned out the building was an infirmary. It had several beds you'd normally see in a nurses office lined up along the walls. There were cabinets and shelves with medicine and other medical stuff on them. Izzie squealed and ran up to the cabinets. "F-Finally! I-I didn't think I'd ever see my love again!" she yelled out happily as she caressed the cabinets. Dennis and I exchanged confused looks. "Uhh... what are yo-" Dennis began, but was cut off by Izzie.

"Oh right, I never told you guys, did I!" she giggled. "I aspire to be a doctor or a surgeon when I grow up, and going to med school to get my degree for the practice is my dream!" she told us.

"W-What?!" Dennis looked a bit cheesed off. "If that were the case, why the hell didn't you help out more with Beary's murder investigation?"

"I wanna be a doctor, not a forensic pathologist!" she hissed.

"Yeah, but even so you'd still need to know about how the human body works and what could cause death!" he pressed on.

"Well, a little I guess... if someone gets murdered again I will try to get a better analysis on the body, especially now that I have medical equipment on hand" she grinned. "Also, if anyone gets sick or hurt I'm the girl you wanna come to! Of course, make sure you are nice to me, because you never know when your life will be in my hands" she giggled.

My eyes widened a little bit at her comment. Dennis rolled his eyes. "Well that would make finding the killer alot easier, wouldn't it" he gave her a smirk. Izzie hissed at him in response. "Whatever, I'm just sayin' you shouldn't be an asshole to someone who has the power to help you medically. I don't have to actually kill you myself. I can just let your ailments kill you without helping you if you're going to be rude to me"

"Well, Mary, looks like we need to be extra polite to Izzie" Dennis told me. He seemed a bit sarcastic with the statement. Izzie continued to look through the stuff in the cabinets excitedly. "I just wanna stay in here all day!" she told us.

"We need to check out other things, Izzie!" Dennis huffed. He then pulled on Izzie's shirt collar and dragged her out. "C'mon!"

I followed after them. Izzie broke away from Dennis and dusted herself off with a bitter look on her face.

"Where to next?" I asked Dennis.

"How about that place with the barbell on it" Dennis pointed over to the building.

"But that looks boring!" Izzie protested.

"C'mon Izzie!" Dennis sighed.

Reluctantly, Izzie followed us to the building. We went inside and saw that it was a gym. There was exercise machines and equipment lined up all over the room. Mr. Gus, Fart, and Tiger were there checking out all of the equipment.

"This is great!" Tiger smiled as she picked up one of the weights. "We can still do our daily training, Gus!"

Gus smiled. "Yeah! This is indeed a very good find!" he replied. He seemed to have a little bit of a blush on his face as he tried to look away. _Does he like Tiger?_

"I can now make sure I keep my body healthy and in shape" Fart smiled and nodded.

"Ew, exercise" Izzie hissed.

"What's wrong with exercise? It is good for you, young lady!" Fart scolded.

"I'd rather read" Izzie admitted as she brushed her hair back.

"They even have changing rooms" Tiger pointed to a certain corner of the room with two doors. One was labeled "Women" and the other was labeled "Men". After that, I heard Pizza Steve's voice from the entrance.

"Wooo! A gym! Good thing, gotta make sure I'm nice and toned for the ladies~" he tipped his shades with a wink at Ramona, who giggled in response. Izzie didn't seem to like it in here, as she rocked back and forth on her feet impatiently.

"Alright, so we know this is a gym, let's go" Dennis motioned for us to leave.

"My Prince, when you are done looking around here, may we go to the building with the book on it?" she asked him, bowing her head a little as she asked.

"Mmmm I don't know" Pizza Steve picked up a weight. "I really like it in here."

"My Prince, we must gather as much information about this place as we can, I believe it wouldbe wise to not spend too much time in one place right now" she tried making a suggestion.

"Ehh..." he lifted the weight a few times. "Alright." he placed the weight down.

Dennis, Izzie, and I exited the building and Ramona's group followed after us. Our group decided to look in the building with the book on it. Once inside, we found out it was a library. Ramona and Izzie squealed in unison. "Books!" Ramona sang happily as she skipped in. Izzie waltzed in after her. Steve yawned. "Boring..." he sat in one of the chairs with a pout on his face. Dingle and Susie followed Ramona to go look at some books.  
Dennis seemed intrigued by the library. "This could be quite useful, actually" Dennis grinned and started looking at some of the books on the shelves." I began to look with him.

"Ughh Ramona this place is for nerds" Steve whined.

"Shut up!" I heard Ham Sandwiches voice call out. I looked over and saw Ham and Gweelok sitting over by a computer. Eric was with them, but he was reading a book rather than paying attention to what they were doing on the computer. I went over to them to see if they found anything important on the computer. "Hi guys, did you find anything on the computer?"

Gweelok shook his head as he typed away on the computer. "I'm trying to get something but this place lacks wifi, so I can't even access the internet. At least not right now I can't" he admitted to me.

"If we can get on the internet we can try to call for help!" Ham told us their plan.  
"Yeah that would be a good idea!" I nodded.

Suddenly, we heard a loud scream coming from outside. "What was that?" Ramona dropped the book she was looking at.

We all ran outside to see what was going on. We heard the scream again.

"CALL AN AMBULANCE!" the voice cried.

It was coming from the building with the palm tree on it. We all began to run toward the building.

"I THINK I'M DYING!"


	15. Chapter 12

We all ran as fast as we could to the palm tree building. The minute I burst through the door, I saw Slog on the ground in the fetal position. Billy and Guillermo were around him trying to comfort him and help him up. Festro was leaning against the wall and rolling his eyes.

"Slog are you okay?" I ran up to them. In response Slog sniffled and cried.

"He slipped and smashed his face on the wall!" Billy explained, rubbing Slog's back to comfort him.

"He's bleeding!" Guillermo pointed out as Slog lifted his head up to look at everyone. Guillermo was right, there was blood dripping from the slovenly disgustoid's large nose.

"Are you kidding me? It's just a minor injury. Suck it up like a bro, bro!" Festro scolded Slog.

"It hurts!" Slog sobbed as he rubbed his face.

"You're over-reacting" Festro rolled his eyes.

"Leave him alone!" Billy snapped at Festro.

Izzie pushed her way through the crowd and held her hands out for everyone to back up.  
"Listen up you filthy animal..." Izzie began as she stooped down to Slog who was still on the ground. "Get up and come with me!" she told him, offering her hand.

Slog sniffled as he took her hand and let her help him up. Izzie walked out of the building with him. Dennis, Billy, Guillermo, Festro, and I followed. Izzie lead us back to the infirmary. She had Slog sit down on one of the cots as she went over to the mini fridge and took out an icepack before grabbing a couple of paper towels off the counter. She wrapped the papertowels around the icepack and sat next to Slog.

"First, I want you to lean forward a bit and slightly droop your head down" Izzie instructed him. He did what she asked him to do, still sniffling. "Also stop crying you're gonna make your pain worse!" she told him coldly but calmly.

"I-I can't help it" he sobbed.

"Try and help it! Now pinch your nostrils together with one hand and hold an icepack to your big shnoz with the other hand" she told him. He tried to the best of his ability to perform the task she told him to do, but needed a bit of guidance with it. The fact he needed guidance frustrated Izzie a bit.

"It's cold" Slog complained, sounding a bit strange because he is holding his nose.

"That's a good thing, it's going to help stop the bleeding. Breathe through your mouth and sit like that for 10 minutes." she instructed him.

"10 minutes?!" Slog groaned.

"Do you want your nose to stop bleeding?" Izzie snapped

"Y-Yes..." he squeaked.

"Then do what I tell you" she told him before getting up and walking over to us. "He'll be fine, he just has a nose bleed. If he follows my instructions the bleeding should stop within 10 to 20 minutes."

"Oh thank goodness! Thank you very much, Izzie!" Billy grinned and nodded at Izzie.

"No problem! Just make sure he listens, I have to go back with my group to continue exploring, because I'm sure they want to finish that up before we all have to meet back up with each other" she told them.

"I'll make sure he listens" Billy told her.

"Ugh so boring!" Festro sat down on the cot next to Slog's and crossed his arms.  
Izzie ignored Festro's complaints. "C'mon Mary and Dennis. I believe we have a few more things that need to be checked out!" she motioned for us to come.

We all followed her to the building with the palm tree on it. We went inside and immediately began looking around. After passing through the lobby, we opened the large double-doors across the hall. This lead us to a large room with a pool.

"Woah!" I said out loud.

"Well this is dissappointing" Dennis sighed.

"Dissappointing?" we heard Pizza Steve's voice ask in complete disbelief.

We all turned to see him standing there with that usual smirk on his face.

"Dude," Pizza Steve looked around before leaning towards Dennis. He hushed his voice into a whisper, but I could still hear what he was saying. "the pool means the ladies are gonna be wearin' their bikinis! How are you not excited about that?"

Dennis gave him a frustrated sigh in response.

"Well if that's not your thing, I ain't gonna judge" Pizza Steve shrugged and went back with the rest of his group.

"I think this is actually a pretty good find," I admitted. "I like to swim."

"I don't," Izzie hissed. "and after hearing what that pervert whispered to Dennis I'm even more inclined not to want to go swimming!"

I nodded and looked around. There were changing rooms there as well, along with a closet that most likely contained pool supplies and a few benches lined around the pool. The pool also has a diving board.

"Well we checked everything that needed to be checked." Dennis pointed out with a sigh.  
"Yeah, why don't we head back to the cafeteria?" I suggested.

My group nodded and we left to make our way to the cafeteria. When we headed back, Ham Sandwich's group with Gweelok and Eric were sitting at the table. It seemed Gweelok was writing things down in a notepad as Ham Sandwich and Eric sat beside him looking bored.

"Hello!" I greeted them.

"Hi Mary!" Eric looked happy to see people that weren't in his group. "Is it time for everyone to meet up soon?"

I nodded to his question. I felt really bad for Eric, he seemed so bored. I understand, though, as the people in his group don't really have the same interests as he does.  
"What's the disgustoid working on?" Izzie asked Ham Sandwich, refusing to acknowledge Gweelok.

"Silence!" Gweelok answered for Ham. "I am working on something very important!"  
Izzie rolled her eyes in response. Soon the other groups came in and sat down at the table. Once everyone was in, Fart stood up and looked around at everyone. "Okay! Let us now all discuss what we have found!"

He was about to address one of the groups, but Tanezumi came up and interrupted.

"I see you found the newest part of the Amusement Park!" she giggled.

Everyone groaned as she intruded on our meeting.

"Aww come on, now! Don't look so upset! I've come here to bring you some news!" she informed us. "Do you want to hear it?"

"Not really." Pizza Steve sighed, clearly annoyed.

"Too bad, Steve-o!" she cackled. "I came to propose something to you because there's a whole lot of kumbaya going around and not enough kill-all-ya"

"Are you serious? Four people died already and we've only been here for a few days!" Dennis yelled as he tugged on his hair.

"If it were up to me you all would have been dead on the first day! However, doing that would have been super boring! Plus, I don't want all that icky murder on my hands. It's more entertaining when all of yous have red hands of homocide!" She explained to us. "Anyways, I wanted to propose another incentive"

"An incentive?" Susie's eyes widened as she began to hug herself.

"Yes! An incentive to want to murder each other!" she cackled as she pulled a big folder out of her pocket and waved it in front of our faces. "This file contains some deep-dark secrets about everyone in the amusement park!" she told us. "Deep-dark secrets that I will reveal to EVERYONE if a murder does not get done by tommorow night!"

"W-What?" Ham Sandwich looked worried.

"How would you even know these things?" Mr. Gus raised his eyebrow, clearly skeptical of her incentive.

"Sounds to me like you're just bluffing to get us to kill each other, but that's not really gonna happen" Steve gave her a sarcastic smirk.

"Oh really, Steve? That's not what you said to everyone before dinner last night. In fact, you were sure everyone was out to get each other" Tanezumi gave him a malicious grin. "I saw the whole thing!"

"I have no clue what you are talking about" Steve gave her a shrug.

"Well, if you think this folder is a bluff, meet me at the mini stage set up next to the amusement park rides!" she giggled before disappearing.

"That fucking rat" Festro shook his head.

"Should we meet her?" Guillermo asked with concern in his voice.

"No, she's clearly lying!" Dennis said. "She just wants us to distrust each other so we can fight and do what she wants again!"

"Well, it won't hurt to check!" Susie suggested.

"No!" Mr. Gus held his hands out. "Do not entertain the rat! Ignore her! We must stick together and ignore her tricks! Dennis is right, she just wants us all to fight and distrust each other."

"Indeed, now we should go over what we observed in the new area we explored now" Fart told us as he tapped his clipboard.

We all nodded and began to discuss our findings. Everyone took turns explaining what they found, and it seemed to be the same things we found when we took a look around.

"Ah I see, but what about the computer in the library? Gweelok spent alot of time on it!" Ramona pointed out.

Everyone turned to Gweelok for an explanation, but he just waved his hands as he continued to jot things down in a notebook.

"I am not finished working! I'll let you know when I'm ready to talk about it!" he told us.

Ham Sandwich let out a sigh. "Gweelok you've been obsessed with that computer and forgot about me, your buddy!"

"Son, never trust a nerd!" Festro told him.

"First of all, I am NOT your son. Second of all, I'm a nerd so fuck you very much!" Ham Sandwich told him as he pushed up his glasses with his middle finger.

"That's my boy!" Festro laughed and clapped.

"I promise I will talk to you all when I am finished working, now please leave me alone!" Gweelok insisted again.

"Well, Ham, I'm in your group still and I'm more than happy to talk to you." Eric gave him a genuine smile.

"You don't even play video games like I do what would we even talk about?" Ham talked down to him with a snooty attitude.

"Nevermind then" Eric rolled his eyes.

"Alright, well, we finished discussing things, what now?" Guillermo asked.

"I guess we can just relax until dinner time" Mr. Gus told us. "Remember to stay with your groups, meeting dismissed!"

We all piled out of the cafeteria and went our seperate ways with out group.

"I think we should check out what Tanezumi has to say." Izzie told Dennis and I immediately after leaving the cafeteria.

"No way! I told you, she's just trying to trick us!" Dennis huffed angrily.

"Well if she's just trying to trick us, what would be the problem with seeing what that folder has to say?" Izzie argued.

"Let's just not do it okay!" Dennis tried to dismiss the conversation.

"Izzie has a point" I said. "If she is just trying to trick us, there wouldn't be anything important in the folder"

"Yeah, and if there's nothing important in the folder, it would be a waste of time to even bother looking!" Dennis pointed out.

"What do we really have to do that's so important anyways? You and I both hate most of the activities that the amusement park has to offer, so why not spend a few minutes out of this boring day to see what that stupid pink rat has to say so we can laugh about how ridiculous she is?" Izzie asked.

Dennis let out a sigh. "This is a bad idea, but whatever. Let's go entertain that stupid rat."

To be honest, I was really interested to see what she had in that folder. I had a morbid curiosity of what could be so deep dark and secret to us that it would be an incentive to murder.

We approached the mini stage and found Ramona's group standing in front of it holding pieces of paper and Tanezumi up on the stage holding the folder. Tanezumi saw us approach and laughed. "Dennis! Izzie! Mary! So glad you could make it!" she handed each of us a slip of paper. "Here you go! Let's see if you doubt me now"

I immediately gave mine a look over before laughing. _Is me picking my nose in 3rd grade really that big of a secret?_

"Tanezumi, no offense, but this secret of mine isn't that dark and deep" I told her.  
"What?" Tanezumi looked shocked.

"Yeah what the hell, this isn't even that bad!" Dennis hit his paper with a grin.

Izzie gave out a laugh. "I stole a bunch of dead frogs from my school to practice and study dissection on back in 10th grade, big deal!" she admitted to all of us.

"Deep and dark indeed! I stole one of the Prince's shirts to cuddle with every night!" Ramona told us sarcastically as she laughed.

"You what?" Steve looked at her, lowering his sunglasses.

"You mean you never noticed? Do you want the shirt back?" Ramona looked a bit surprised.

"No I didn't know... but it's cool you can keep it if it makes you happy," he told her. "buuut why just cuddle the prince's shirt when you can cuddle the actual prince" he lowered his sunglasses and winked at her.

Ramona giggled and gave him a big smile.

"These are worthless pieces of junk!" Dennis told her as he handed his slip of paper back to her. The rest of us handed in our papers.

"Well alright then, I guess you won't mind me reading them outloud tommorow. No big deal!" she grinned before disappearing.

Izzie rolled her eyes. "What a waste of time!"

"My Prince, if you do not mind me asking, what did yours say?" she tilted her head.

"Oh uh.." Steve tugged at his collar before clearing his throat and flipping his hair. "It said that I was terrible at Italian Karate, which is a total bogus lie anyways! I mean no one would believe that!" he laughed, a hint of nervousness in it.

Ramona giggled. "Wow! What a terrible lie! Everyone knows you are very good at Italian Karate" she reassured him.

"C'mon, let's just go hang out" Steve told the rest of his group before they headed off.  
"I told you it would be a waste of time!" Dennis told us.

"Well at least we can sit and laugh about it now" Izzie told us.

Tanezumi appeared back on the stage as Billy's group approached. Tanezumi gave them all slips of paper. They all looked at them and laughed.

"Yeah I have a nice pair of abs! If I take my shirt off that would be very obvious!" Slog laughed as he handed her the paper.

"I thought you were ashamed of them" Tanezumi looked frustrated.

"I'm not ashamed of my body!" Slog gasped and looked a bit offended. "I just don't show off alot because I don't like to be gawked at! People have gawked at me and made me feel really uncomfortable and sad, but how I feel about my body has nothing to do with that!"

"Yeah I mean this is obvious information. Of course I have toe fungus, what kind of respectable disgustoid would I be if I didn't?" Festro shrugged and gave her the paper.

Everyone handed their paper's back laughing and walked away. Tanezumi was really angry.

"Oooh you think you're all so great! Just you wait, some of you aren't as comfortable to share these secrets!" Tanezumi hissed as she crossed her arms.

"C'mon, let's get the hell outta here!" Izzie told us.

We decided to play a few games in the arcade, read a few books in the library, and talk to the other groups before dinner time. When dinner time came around, we all got our food and sat down at the table. Some people were a bit more quiet than usual.

"So I heard some of you went to go look at what Tanezumi had to say" Mr. Gus sounded disappointed.

"Yo, don't worry MG, it wasn't even that big of a deal! Nothing too important on those papers. Just stupid things" Pizza Steve reassured him.

"Still, why entertain her?" Mr. Gus sighed.

"Like I told Dennis, if what she had to say was stupid, which it was, then why worry about it? We're not fighting with each other, we're all in a somewhat decent mood tonight, let it go" Izzie told him.

Mr. Gus let out another sigh. "I guess you're right."

"Dingle, you've been really quiet ever since we read those papers, are you alright?" Ramona seemed concerned.

Dingle nodded. "Blaggle blegh blaggle"

"Oh! Okay, I understand! It has been a rough few days, and anyone would be tired" Ramona nodded.

"I don't get it though..." Slog poked at his food.

"What's the matter?" Billy looked at him with concern.

"If she knows all those dumb things about us, would she have other, more personal things to tell everyone about us tommorow?" Slog looked up with wide eyes.

"W-What do you mean?" Susie poked her fingers together.

"I think what he means is, that even if these dumb things were obvious, she knew that they were completely specific to us. If she can uncover those without us really having to tell her, what else could she have uncovered?" Billy explained.

Everyone fell silent and began to look at each other. Mr. Gus let out a groan.

"See! This is what I was talking about! Now you're all worried and she has you right where she wants you!" Mr. Gus

"I told you to fucking let it go because no one is fighting!" Izzie gritted her teeth as she snapped.

"Excuse me, but you don't tell me what to do!" Mr. Gus seemed agitated.

"Guys stop!" Tiger slammed her hands on the table to get our attention. Everyone fell silent again.

"It's not good to worry about things like that, I'm sure we'll be okay. Like Mr. Gus has been saying, she is only trying to trick us. If we don't acknowledge her tricks we'll all be fine!" Fart reassured us.

"Fart is right!" we heard Uncle Grandpa's voice. We all looked up to see him standing on the table. How he got there without us noticing before is beyond me.

"Eyy Uncle G! Long time no see" Steve greeted.

"Hello Pizza Steve" Uncle Grandpa waved to him, getting distracted a bit before snapping back to whatever he was about to tell us. "Anyways, the Fart is right! Tanezumi is trying to make you guys hate each other! Don't let her do that! Whatever secrets you may have should not affect your friendships with everyone here! It shouldn't because you are all friends and care about each other. I care about all of you too!"

"Thank you, Uncle Grandpa" Mr. Gus smiled.

"You're welcome, Mr. Gus" Uncle Grandpa nodded and pat his head. "Things have been rough lately after we lost 4 of our friends, but do not give up hope! Each and every one of you sitting here now is still alive and we should work hard to keep it that way!" he began to tear up again. "I can't afford to lose another one of you!"

"Sorry I mentioned anything" Slog apologized, sighing and looking down at his food glumly.

"Don't be upset, Slog! You mentioned a good point!" Billy reassured him as he pat his back.

"I believe in all of you!" Uncle Grandpa told us before disappearing.

After that, dinner was pretty quiet with the exception of some people talking quietly amongst themselves. After dinner was over, we went with our groups to try and enjoy the rest of our time in the amusement park before we go to bed. Nothing too important happened, but I did see Dingle slip away with Festro shortly after dinner.

After hanging out for a little while, Tanezumi's usually night-time announcement was heard.

"Hey you little shits! It's 11 PM, the amusement park is CLOSED! You better get your stupid butts out of attraction buildings and off the rides because after this time of night, there is nothing here for you! Come back at 9 AM when the park reopens. Au Revoir~"

We all made our way back to the hotel. I was actually kind of glad to go to bed, today was very boring, and it didn't seem like anyone was trying to lift the mood up from the previous days we endured. The only thing that worried me before going to sleep was what Slog mentioned at dinner. If Tanezumi knew those silly personal things about us, what else would she possibly know and announce tommorow? I know Mr. Gus and other people have said not to worry about it, but I can't help but worry. I closed my eyes and went to sleep. The next morning I was awaken by Tanezumi's usual morning announcement, but something about this announcement was different. Very different. Frighteningly different. _It's exactlly what we were worried about._


	16. Intermission 3

**❀ ✿ TANEZUMI'S TALK SHOW ✿ ❀ **  
_(ﾉ◕ヮ◕__)ﾉ～ 『✧__~*One time, I placed an order at a department store for a specific set of furniture that I wanted. The shipping took longer than expected, and when I went to go pick it up, the furniture wasn't even fucking right! I complained about this, but the fucking asshole clerk told me the only thing they could do is reorder a new one. So I says "You mean to tell me that I have to wait a long time AGAIN for furniture I ordered LAST WEEK and wanted for THIS WEEK?" That DEFINITELY wasn't flying by me. So you know what I did? I took that bitch of a store clerk and all the mother fuckers who were standing in line and made them into the furniture pieces I wanted! Nothing beats DIY projects! ~(⊙ω⊙✿)』_


	17. Chapter 13

"Waakke up you little shits! I'm changing things up a bit today! Throughout the day I'm going to announce each and every single one of yous's deepest darkest secrets!" Tanezumi's shrill voice echoed through my room.

I bolted right up to stare at the screen. She was in her usual morning announcement gear.

"First up for some bean spilling, none other than SLOG~" she laughed as she pulled up a piece of paper. "I chose this idiot first because he was the first to suggest that I knew alot more than I was tellin' yous. And boy was he right! Who woulda thunk?"

I was not expecting what she was about to say.

"Did you know, Slog used to prostitute himself back in his own dimension? I guess times were really rough and poverty was very high! Nothing a few dick-lickings couldn't take care of!" she cackled as she said it. "Though I have no idea who'd want to touch that bag of fleas, but to each their own I guess! Just don't touch his mouth, the last time he brushed his teeth was probably with a dick burrito! Stay tuned in a half an hour for the scoop on PIZZA STEVE!"

The TV shut off. My jaw dropped. _That was really really low!_ I could not believe what I had ust heard. Was it even true? If it is what else is she going to say about everyone else? I quickly got ready to talk to the others. _Poor Slog..._

As soon as I was done getting ready I left the room. I saw Pizza Steve exit his room. When he saw me he giggled. "Jesus what kind of bogus was that? Who'd believe any of that bullshit? Tanezumi is a lying sack of shit!"

"Do you really think so?" I asked.

"Oh yeah! I mean c'mon, Slog is probably the most least likely person to do what she said he did. If she thinks we're that stupid then she's sadly mistaken." he told me.

"I hope you're right..." I wasn't so sure about that. I did agree that what Tanezumi said was outrageous and I can't really see Slog doing something like that, but you never really know.

Billy immediately burst out of his room and went right to Slog's. He pounded on the door. "Slog are you okay? Slog?"

It was several moments and Slog didn't answer. Everyone began to emerge from their rooms. Dingle, Gweelok, and Fart ran to Slog's door and began to pound on it with Billy. Festro approached but he crossed his arms with a smirk on his face. "Ahaha dick burritos."

Billy shot Festro a glare for the comment. Shortly after, Slog opened his door a bit to peak out. There were tear streaks all over his cheeks, his eyes were bright red, and there were snots coming out of his nose. "W-What do y-you want?" he sobbed violently.

"Are you okay?" Billy asked.

"Y-Yes j-just leave m-me alone" he shut his eyes and snuffled. "I'm s-sure you will be f-fine without m-me I-I am g-gross anyw-ways"

Steve's smirk disappeared as he lowered his sunglasses to reveal widened eyes.

"Wait. Was what she said true?" he asked before taking a nervous gulp.

Slog didn't respond to the question. "I won't be at breakfast" he told us before shutting his door.

Steve's face turned pale as he slowly pushed his sunglasses back up. "And I'm fucking next..." he muttered.

"Okay, guys, let's let him calm down. For now, let us go to breakfast and discuss what's going on" Mr. Gus told everyone, trying to calm everyone down.

Everyone nodded and followed him to the cafeteria. I was ready to follow but I saw Billy lean up against Slog's door.

"Slog, can you hear me?" he asked.

"Y-Yes" I heard Slog's voice say.

"Listen, Slog, if what she said was true about you, I want you to know that I accept you no less. You are still a very kind and wonderful Disgustoid who tries really hard to help others. Whatever you did are things you had to do for the times and those actions do not make you any less of a person. Forget about what Festro or anyone else has to say, don't let them dictate how you should feel about yourself. I'll let you take a little bit to calm down and have a little bit of time to yourself, but remember that I am here for you and so are your friends and we all care about you!" Billy told him.

I could hear Slog sobbing on the other side.

"T-Thank you, Billy. That means alot to me!" he gushed.

"You're welcome. Now I'm gonna go to breakfast, do you want me to save you anything?" Billy asked.

"Just a piece of toast" Slog requested. "But before you go I want to tell you something"

"Yes?"

"I didn't do what I did for just my hardships. I did it for my mother. She was really sick at the time and the medical bills were outrageously expensive. I didn't know what else to do and I couldn't let her die. I loved my mother." Slog began to cry again.

Billy looked really touched and upset too. "I'm really sorry about your mother."

"It's okay, just go get some breakfast I don't want to keep you waiting."

"I'll be back for you."

Billy nodded and began to walk towards the stairs. He saw me standing there.

"Well that's quite rude and nosy of you" Billy narrowed his eyes and put his hands on his hips.

"I-I'm sorry! I couldn't help but overhear!" I told Billy. "I promise I'm not judging or anything!"

"Well I hope you aren't because that would show poor character!" Billy told me. "C'mon, let's go to the cafeteria."

We made our way to the cafeteria, but we were stopped half way by Guillermo and Festro.

"Oh there you guys are! C'mon! Breakfast is already being served!" Guillermo told us as he grabbed my hand.

Once in the cafeteria, we got our food and sat down.

"Okay, what we all need to do is remain calm! Tanezumi is trying to make us all crazy and distrust each other! We cannot let her do that!" Mr. Gus told everyone.

"Well it's kinda easy for you to say as you weren't announced next on the dirt dish!" Pizza Steve pointed out, a bit of panic in his voice.

"Well if you don't have anything too serious to hide, why don't we all just state are deepest, darkest secrets to everyone right now!" Guillermo suggested.

"I like this idea" Mr. Gus nodded.

"No! We shouldn't have to open up personal things about ourselves! That's plain stupid and I don't feel comfortable with telling all of you my secrets!" Gweelok protested.

"I agree! This is ludicrous!" Izzie hissed.

"If you don't have anything horrible to hide then why should it even be a problem?" Tiger asked.

"It doesn't matter what you're hiding, the fact is it's hidden for a reason and no one should force you to open up things you are not comfortable opening up!" Ramona insisted.

Suddenly, the TV came on and Tanezumi appeared on the screen.

"Annddd here we are with some nice juicy gossip on PIZZA STEEEEVVEE~" she imitated the way he sometimes said his own name. "Or should I even CALL him Steve? That sleaze ball isn't who he says he is. In fact, he could be 1 of 6 different people at any given moment but you'll never know when and where. Not to mention every other word out of his mouth is a lie anyways. Be careful with him too, he likes to eat his own kind for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Hide your pizza pies, Hannibal Lector is on the loose! And this little tidbit shout out goes to Ramona, because I see you mackin' on that pathetic excuse of a person alot. I hope you like your prince's bread-stick with one meatball rather than two!" Tanezumi cackled. "Next up... MR. GUS and after that FESTRO!"

The TV shut off and the whole room was in complete silence. Everyone slowly turned to look at Steve, who's face was paler than before.

"I-Is that all true?" Ramona looked really concerned.

Steve bit his lip, a bead of sweat dripping down his forehead. "Uhh..." he smiled nervously. "No... not at all I have no idea what she's talking about!" he leaned back and crossed his legs.

The TV turned back on again.

"Don't lie to them, Steve-o. I can show them some nice pieces of evidence! Like this picture for example" Tanezumi flashed a picture of Steve holding the severed limb of another pizza person. There was a red-orange substance all over his mouth, which looked kind of like pizza sauce. He wasn't wearing his sunglasses, so you could see his eyes which looked a bit different than they normally looked.

"Keep lying, sleaze ball, and I'll show them pictures of your half castration!" Tanezumi cackled before the TV shut off.

A few people in the room panicked and ran out of the cafeteria. The atmosphere in the room became quite uncomfortable.

"I-I..." a single tear rolled down Steve's cheek.

"Great! We share an island with a schizophrenic cannibal!" Dennis threw his hands up in the air.

"It's Multiple Personality Disorder you uneducated fuck-bucket!" Steve snapped at him. "And it's none of anyone's fucking concern or business!"

Ramona was staring at Steve with wide and concerned eyes.

"Yeah yeah, it's all true, okay! I have MPS, I have a tendency to exaggrate my achievements, I eat other pizza people sometimes, and I have one testicle. I understand if you can't look at me as a prince anymore, Mona." he sighed as he got up and began to walk away.

"You stay here!" Mr. Gus tried to order him.

"I don't have to listen to you" Pizza Steve flipped him off as he walked out of the cafeteria.

Ramona looked around and shortly followed after him. Mr. Gus tried to stop her, but it was too late. Mr. Gus sighed and put his head in his hands. Tiger pat his back.

"This is exactly what Tanezumi wanted!" Mr. Gus sighed.

We stood in silence for the rest of the time. A few people left the cafeteria. Soon, Tanezumi came up on the TV again.

"MISTER GUUUUSS THE DINO-MAN~" she sang. "He tries to act all calm, but inside he's a raging fiery volcano that'll snap at any moment. He's been struggling with anger problems for quite a while now, so I'd be careful around if I were you. You all stupidly chose him to be your unofficial leader. Make sure you don't get under his skin, or that fucker might murder you!" she told us cheerfully. "The more you know! Next up FESTRO!" she told us before the TV shut off.

Mr. Gus let out a sigh. Everyone shifted uncomfortable and seemed a bit weary around Gus.

"Hey, man, if I ever said anything to offend you, I didn't mean it" Izzie apologized to him.

Suddenly, Dingle burst through the cafeteria.

"BLAGGLE BLAGGLE BLEGH!" Dingle shouted as he pointed toward the exit in a panic.  
Everyone's eyes widened as they got up. We did not understand what Dingle was saying, but we could tell something had happened. We followed Dingle as he gathered some more people that were in the immediate area. We all followed him to the library, where Festro was lying in the middle of the floor holding his head.

"What happened?" I gasped

"I was tryin' to hide from the crazy cannibal pizza! He thinks books are for nerds so I didn't think he'd find me in here, but before I knew it I was clonked on the head!" he told us, rubbing the bloody spot on his head. He then looked around with wide eyes. "Wait! W-Where's Guillermo?"

We all looked around frantically.

"Oh no! Whoever clonked me on the head must have took Guillermo!" Festro screeched.'

"We gotta find him!" Mr. Gus exclaimed.

"Oh no no! We gotta make sure we monitor you! You might try to eat him!" Susie accused.

That was really unexpected from Susie. She's usually really quiet and timid.

We all split up into random uneven groups as we went to search for Guillermo. My group, which consisted of Gweelok, Dennis, and Ramona, went to search in the gym. We searched the dressing rooms, the closets, and all the other equipment.

We found absolutely nothing in the gym. However, as we were about to leave, the TV turned on and Tanezumi was wearing a party hat. The same Blue's Clues "Letter" theme played as she began to dance.

"WE JUST FOUND A BODY~! WE JUST FOUND A BODY~! WE JUST FOUND A BODY~! I WONDER WHO KILLED IT!"

We quickly ran out of the gym after the announcement. Billy burst out of the pool building screaming "HE'S DEAD HE'S DEAD!" frantically.


	18. Chapter 14

Everyone piled into the building with the palm tree on it and burst into the room with the pool in it. We all stood around the pool, where Mr. Gus emerged from the water taking a deep breath as he held Guillermo. He placed Guillermo onto the ground next to the pool.

Izzie immediately went up to Guillermo's body and tried pushing on his chest. After a bit of trying with that, Izzie sat down on the ground with a defeated look on her face. "He's really dead..." she announced.

Gasps were heard all around the room before it completely fell silent. "W-Why?" Susie's crying broke the silence. Just then, Slog and Steve burst into the room.

"Who died?!" Steve yelled out the question, completely bewildered.

Everyone turned to face Steve.

"Should we update Dr. Jekyll on what Mr. Hyde did while everyone was in a panic?" Dennis gritted his teeth angrily as he pointed at Steve.

"Shut the fuck up, I didn't do anything!" Steve hissed back.

"Oh sure you didn't! And gravity doesn't keep us grounded!" Dennis retorted.

"But gravity is just a theory..." Uncle Grandpa appeared seemingly out of nowhere, eating an apple. He stopped mid bite and chucked his apple across the room when he saw Guillermo's dead body.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Uncle Grandpa screeched as he dropped down to his knees next to Guillermo.

"BUT WHY?!" Uncle Grandpa began to cry.

"Because someone didn't want me to spill the beans on them" Tanezumi giggled, holding a folder.

"YOU!" Festro boomed as he pointed at her.

"Yes, me" Tanezumi shrugged him off before handing the folder to Mr. Gus. "Here's the autopsy report, you know the drill with investigation"

"This is ridiculous!" Tiger screeched as she stamped her foot in frustration.

"Though, I must say, I plan on doing our meeting a bit differently this time!" Tanezumi began to laugh as she placed the folder on the ground. "Gather as much information as you possibly can, you're going to need it!"

With that, Tanezumi left us. She left us afraid, angry, and full of distrust.

"Well, investigation is easy! We already know who did it!" Dennis shot a glare at Steve.

"You're a fucking idiot if you think the culprit was me" Steve told him with a smirk.

"Oh? Well explain how it WOULDN'T be you then" Dennis gave him a look of disgust.

"Yeah, I mean you literally were the last to run in here" Eric pointed out.

"Well first of all, PIZZA STEVE would NEVER kill anybody" he said, that weird change in tone happening again. These weird transitions in his behavior must be some kind of personality shift. He began to sound serious like he did back when he alienated the group after the first Death Match. "At least, none of the frequents would anyways. Too much blood for their pretty hands" he told us. _It was so strange hearing him say that. What does he even mean by frequents?_

"Second of all, isn't it just all too easy to blame the man with the disorder?" he asked us. Everyone was silent as they thought about his proposed question. "I mean SURELY it's just so easy to point at the unstable person in a group and say 'Yep! It was totally him!'. Do you REALLY think it's that easy?"

"W-Well, yes, it is pretty easy. I mean if they are unstable they could easily hurt others." Susie stated.

"And that's what the murderer would want you to think." Steve gave us a light chuckle and a smirk as he crossed his arms. "Set up the unstable one so the mastermind could get away with the crime"

"He has a point..." I said.

"Of course I have a point. I wouldn't be saying anything if I didn't!" he pushed up his sunglasses before picking up the folder. "Let's read the autopsy report, shall we?" he lowered his sunglasses as he opened up the folder, beginning to read the words aloud.

"Guillermo was found dead in the community swimming pool at 10:25 am. There seems to be no visible bruises, lesions, abrasions, or cuts on him."

Steve lowered his sunglasses more and squinted his eyes.

"That's interesting..." he muttered.

"GIVE ME THAT!" Dennis snatched it out of his hands and gave it a look over. "What?! There's no way that's all it says! There's barely any information here!" Dennis hit the folder with frustration.

Izzie let out a little sigh as she began to exit the room.

"Young lady, where do you think you are going?" Mr. Gus asked her, a bit of anger in his voice.

"I'll be back, cool your jets! Investigation is important." she told us before leaving.

"She's right, if I were all of you, I'd get cracking on this investigation!" Steve chuckled, seeming awfully calm for the particular situation.

"You're trying to play coy, we know it was you!" Dennis shook his angry fist at him.

Some of the others had began to look around the room, and I decided to join them. This case wasn't going to solve itself! Besides, what Pizza Steve said about how easy it was to blame him really stuck with me, and it didn't make the series of events sit well at all. _All I really know is, that someone murdered Guillermo, and I'm going to find out who it is._

"We need someone to watch over Guillermo's body to make sure the murderer doesn't try to tamper with it" Mr. Gus told us. "I will stay" Susie offered. "And I'll help her" Slog told us. "Again, I'm not very good with this investigation stuff."

I went over to Guillermo's dead body and gave him a look over. Indeed, just like the report said, there were no bruises, lesions, abrasions, or cuts present on his body. It pretty much looked like he had drowned. Just then, something caught my eye. I squinted as I saw it. _His face looked liked it had some kind of allergic reaction to something_. Compared with the rest of his body, his face seemed puffy and red. _How curious..._

Just then, Izzie pushed me aside. "Move it! Doctor Izzie is here to examine the patient!" she told me as she put on a pair of rubber gloves. "He's dead..." I told her with a sigh. "And the autopsy report has little to no information regarding how his death happened, so you need me to figure it out for you!" she told me as she placed a medical case she brought from the infirmary next to Guillermo's body and immediately went to work examining him. I decided to let Izzie do her doctor stuff as I got up and began to look around the area.

I went over by the pool and looked inside of it. It looked pretty clear. Eric must have been examining the pool with me, because something caught his eye enough for him to take off his shirt and shoes and dive in. I was surprised by this sudden action. I heard Susie scream "GUILLERMO DIED IN THERE". After a few seconds, Eric resurfaced holding an object. "It's a metal funnel!" he told us as he held it up. "Wow, you dived into a pool someone died in to find a funnel!" Dennis rolled his eyes. "You people are sick!"

Eric sighed. "Well I wanted to help contribute to the investigation, but if you're going to act like that..." he threw the funnel on the ground surrounding the pool before he pulled himself out. I bent over to pick up the funnel and examine it. It looked like it could fit over someone's nose and mouth. Like as if to breathe something in. _That's really strange..._

I turned to Eric and nodded. "I think you made a good find and a good contribution!" I told him.

"Thank you Mary! At least SOMEONE appreciates me!" he exclaimed.

Next, I decided to check out the supplies closet. There, I saw Pizza Steve and Mr. Gus standing there. Steve let out a tsk tsk. "Well we can tell some of the pool supplies are missing" he told Mr. Gus. I looked over them to see what they were talking about. When I looked inside, I couldn't really tell what they were talking about. It seemed like everything that should have been there was there. "What exactly is missing?" I asked.

"One of the pool chemicals" Mr. Gus pointed out. "But we're not exactly sure which one it is or why it's missing."

"What's this?" Steve stooped over as he asked the question. Mr. Gus and I stooped with him to see what caught his attention.

"Ohoho. A few drops of blood!" Steve chuckled as he pointed to a spot in the closet that had a few drops of blood present on it.

Steve immediately backed out of the closet and rubbed his chin before smirking and walking away.

"Hey, get back over here!" Mr. Gus followed after him. I went into the closet to take more of a look around. I then realized what Steve was smirking about. Looking closely at the droplets, they seem to be trailing off further into the center of the closet. _What an interesting arrangement_

I got out of the closet and decided to take a look at the changing rooms. I first went into the girl's changing room, where I saw Fart and Tiger looking around. "Oh hello Mary!" Fart greeted me. "Good thing you're here, I think I found something fascinating!"

"It's not really all that fascinating!" Tiger told him. "It's just a misplaced object."

"Yes, it is a misplaced object, but what would it be doing in the changing room?" he asked her as he showed it to both of us. It was a short, plastic tube.

"I still don't really see that as a big deal" Tiger rolled her eyes.

Maybe it wasn't a big deal now, but it might be a handy piece of evidence later. I looked around the room to see if I could find anything else of interest. Alas, I found nothing, so I went over the the boy's changing room to look for any kind of clues to Guillermo's murder.

The minute I walked in, I saw Steve, Gus, Billy, and Ramona standing around a spot in the room. When I went over to them, I saw a very large mass of blood droplets. "They didn't do a good job cleaning up..." Steve chuckled darkly. "it seems as though they did not learn from Frank's grave mistake on not cleaning up properly"

"I-It stinks in here..." Ramona complained.

"Well, there is blood on the floor..." Mr. Gus pointed out to Ramona.

"N-No not that..." Ramona was about to explain what she meant, but Billy interjected into the conversation.

"What I don't understand is, why is there blood in here if Guillermo is free of any kind of injuries. Where did they get the blood from?" he asked.

"They could have gotten it from the infirmary. I think there was a fridge in there with blood packets." Mr. Gus answered.

"We'll have to ask Izzie about that, she spent alot of her time looking around in the infirmary!"

"Listen, it really really stinks in here!" Ramona complained again, more adamantly this time.

"Like what?" Steve asked her.

"Chemicals! It smells badly of chemicals! It's disgusting!" Ramona had her shirt over her nose as she held her shirt over her nose. "How do you not smell it?"

Steve sniffed the air before his eye twitched. He turned to Ramona. "Let's go!" he said as he took her hand and quickly walked out. He looked back at us before exiting. "I wouldn't stay in here much longer if I were you. Wouldn't be a good idea to breathe alot of this shit in."

Mr. Gus sniffed the air and cringed. "Ugh, I smell it now!" he waved his hand over his nose. "Smells like someone really cleaned the pool!"

I sniffed the air and was shocked. The smell of pool chemical was stronger in here than it was in the actual pool area. In fact, it kind of smelled like how the closet smelled. _How strange._ I didn't pay much mind to the smell of the closet, because the closet obviously contained bottles of smelly pool chemicals. But why was this smell in the changing room?

Billy shrugged. "I don't have much of a sense of smell, so I couldn't really tell you if it smells in here or not"

Mr. Gus and I searched around the room to see if we could find the source, and sure enough, we found it. A bottle of pool chemical that was open and hidden behind the waste basket. Mr. Gus cringed. "Ugh, this is a health hazard!" he exclaimed as he pinched his nose together. I pinched my nose as well as I examined the bottle. Unlike the different pool chemicals that were in the closet, which consisted of bottles of chemicals regarding pH and alkalinity regulation, this bottle was a bottle of muriatic acid! _What would this pool chemical be doing in here? This one is probably one of the most dangerous chemicals!_

I looked inside the waste basket it was next to and saw a crumpled up piece of paper and the cap to the bottle of acid. I quickly capped the acid, as to not release anymore of the smell into the room. I let out a cough before uncrumpling the note. The note said.  
_**Guillermo, my dear, I am very afraid. Please meet me in the building with the pool. - Susie**_

My eyes widened as I read the note. _Susie? Why would Susie want to speak with Guillermo in the pool area?_ None of this made sense to me, none of the stories being told were adding up. I think I'm going to have to ask people what they were doing between morning announcements and Guillermo's death. Before I went to go ask everyone questions, I decided to see how Izzie was doing with the examination. I left the room with Mr. Gus and Belly Bag before I approached Izzie, who was very concentrated on her work.

"Hey Izzie, how's the examination going?" I asked her.

"Pretty good so far" Izzie told me before turning to me. "Found out quite a few interesting things, and I now understand why Tanezumi left it out of the autopsy report."

My eyes widened. "W-What? What do you mean?"

"I'm not finished examining him, yet," she began. "however, I found his cause of death VERY interesting" she told me. "Whoever the murderer is, I have to give them some props for being crafty. Unfortunately for them, I figured out something crucial that'll help us with the investigation."


	19. Chapter 15

"It's actually pretty interesting..." Izzie began. "You'd think being at the bottom of a pool he'd have been drowned, but upon closer inspection, it looks like he died from asphyxiation beforehand."

"Beforehand? You mean someone strangled him?" I asked.

"Not quite, I mean, opening his mouth, you can see some pretty severe swelling and some lesions" she told me as she opened his mouth and shined a mini flashlight into it. Just like she described, the inside of his mouth was severely swelled up and bright red.

"Whatever he ate, drank, came into contact with, he had a pretty severe reaction to it. So severe it cut off his breathing and he died. This could either be from an allergic reaction or drinking a certain kind of lethal chemical not meant to be ingested by humans." she told me before closing his mouth and putting a flashlight to his eyes.

"Look how red his eyes are. He was crying pretty heavily shortly before he died. He went through alot of pain during his death." she then went to his orange polo shirt and shined a flashlight on it. "And the murderer threw him in the pool not only to cover up how he actually died, but to wash off whatever blood went on his shirt, because with the reaction he had to whatever he ingested, he vomited blood. This is apparent because the killer didn't realize the blood still left a pretty significant stain on his shirt that can easily be seen when a flashlight is shone on it. That's all I got for now" she finished telling me her report. "Come back to me a bit later and I'll give you anymore information I find."

"Wow! Izzie, that was amazing!" I complimented her.

"Eh, it's nothing but brilliance really" she boasted as she went back to examining him.

"Thank you for all the information, I will definitely come back to see you later!" I told her.

Now that I investigated the pool area, I thought now I should probably start talking to people about what they were doing this morning. The first person I definitely wanted to talk to was Steve, as his secret was not only pretty drastic, but his actions were very inconsistent and strange. I searched around to find him, and sure enough I found him in the pool building's lobby looking at something in the corner. I went up to him.  
"Hello Steve" I greeted him.

"Mmm look what the cat dragged in~" Steve gave a dark chuckle as he turned to me and gave me a smirk.

"I wanted to ask you a few questions..." I told him, hoping he wouldn't mind.

In response he laughed in my face. "Well, it's a good thing I'm not Steve then" he stated.  
"What do you mean?"

"I mean Steve doesn't like unscheduled interviews. You'd need to plan in advance if you wanted to ask him anything. However, I'm not that much of a conceited cock, so I'll entertain your questions" he told me as he casually inspected his nails. "Given they are not stupid questions."

"Well, first of all, if you're not Steve who are you?"

"Who I am is not important. Whether I told you my name or not wouldn't help anything. Next."

"What did you mean when you told us about frequents?"

"Oh geez, I think I'm understanding why Steve hates being asked questions" he shook his head. "It's not really your fault for being ignorant, though. Frequents are personalities that come out often. That's about as simply as I can put it, though I fail to see how this is important."

"Understanding this is important, I think." I told him, trying to hide my frustration with his slightly dismissive behavior. "Last question about you, are you a frequent?"  
"Hell no, I have guardian work to do. But considering the room is empty and Steve's in alot of danger here, I've been becoming a bit more frequent than usual."

That statement just left me more confused than before, but I did promise that was the last question about him personally I would ask.

"Okay... now I-" before I was able to finish my sentence he interrupted me.

"Want to know what I was doing before Guillermo's death? I'm not really sure, I came in shortly after Tanezumi gave us the autopsy report. You'd have to ask another Steve." he told me. "Probably the two frequents. But good luck trying to get anything from Steve, he's a primadonna bitch."

"Oh uh... how would I be able to talk to Steve?" I asked him, still really confused.

"The easiest way is to get a mirror. Another way is to make me cough or sneeze, but I'd rather not do that"

"Okay... well thank you for the information" I nodded before I turned around to walk away.

_Steve is too strange._ I shook my head, trying to think of who else I should speak to regarding Steve's actions. Thinking back to when he stormed out of the cafeteria, I remembered Ramona ran out with him. Perhaps Ramona knew what he was doing. I looked around to find Ramona. Ramona was sitting on a bench in front of the library with a book.

"Ramona" I called out to her. She looked up from her book and gave me a warm smile.

"Greetings, Miss Mary!" she bowed her head in a formal way.

"Aren't you going to participate in the investigation?" I asked her.

"I am. This book is going to help me understand things that are important to the investigation!" she told me as she showed me the title of the book. The book was titled 'Material Safety Data Sheets'

"Safety Data Sheets?" I asked her. She nodded in response as she flipped one of the pages. "Well, I wanted to ask you about Pizza Steve..."

"What about the prince?" she asked me.

"Well, after you both left the cafeteria when Tanezumi finished her announcement on his secret, what was he doing?" I asked.

"He started toward his hotel room and I followed trying to get him to stop walking away. He finally stopped when we were in the courtyard. We spoke about his issues, which I'd rather not repeat because the prince's secrets are confidential information that have been entrusted with only myself. He then went up to his room and I went to go to the library to read some books. However, when I got there I saw you and several others run out to go to the pool area, and I followed because I figured with all the screaming and yelling that something was amiss." she confessed to me.

"Oh, so you were with Steve pretty much the whole time and you saw him walk into the hotel?" I asked her.

"Yes! The prince did not kill Guillermo. I don't understand why Mr. Dennis blames the murder on him!" she told me as she flipped another page in the book she was reading.  
"Well, him talking with you and going up to the hotel would definitely rule him out..." I said. "Thank you for talking with me about this"

"No problem, Miss Mary!" she smiled at me again, her long tongue hanging out of her mouth. "Anything to be of useful service. I hope my services will prove useful during the meeting as well!"

I nodded before leaving. _Now to figure up what the deal is with Festro in the library._ I went around looking for Festro, and I found him eating some snacks in the cafeteria.

"Hello Festro" I greeted him.

"The hell do you want?" he asked me, a bit irritated by my presence.

"I wanted to ask you questions"

"I didn't do nothin'!" he told me, quick to be on the defensive.

"I never said you did anything, I said I wanted to ask you questions regarding the library incident." I explained.

"The murderer knocked me over the head with something and took Guillermo!" he told me.  
"Do you remember what the person looked like?" I asked.

"Actually, I think there were 2 people. I saw a golden-yellow shirt on one person and a green tank top on the other, now that I recall. I'm pretty sure it was Steve and Susie."

His accusation was quite interesting. "Hmm, are you positive that's what you saw?"

"Wouldn't be saying it if I weren't positive!" he told me with frustration in his voice. "I bet it was a murder accomplice case!"

"Do you remember approximately when you were knocked out?" I asked.

"I was knocked out how was I supposed to know?" he continued to get even more frustrated.  
"Well I know that, but do you remember what time you and Guillermo were allegedly hiding in the library?"

"Mmm, maybe around like 10:15? I don't remember! Stop bugging me!" he brushed me off as he continued to eat his snack.

"Alright, well thank you for the information" I told him, a bit of sarcasm in my voice. I left the cafeteria to go inspect the library this time. I went over to the library to investigate the scene. There, Ham Sandwich was sitting at a table examining something while Gweelok was over by that computer again. I approached Ham, but before I could say anything he looked up at me and spoke.

"Mary! I think I found something interesting!" Ham told me with excitement. I sat down next to him to see what he was talking about.

"I think I might have found a murder weapon!" he told me as he showed me a mallet he was examining. The mallet had blood on the head.

"Hmm..." I thought about what Festro told me about how he was struck on the head in the library, which caused him to be knocked out.

"I don't thing that could have been a murder weapon, Ham. Guillermo doesn't have any kind of bruise or cut on him" I told him. "Perhaps this is the weapon that was used to knock out Festro in the library"

"Perhaps..." Ham rubbed his chin. "Though, I must say, I kinda find it strange how they would hit Festro over the head but not Guillermo. If they kidnapped Guillermo from the library, he would have been screaming and someone would have heard!"

"Yeah, that does seem odd..." I thought about it.

"I mean, I know I would scream if someone tried to kidnap me. Besides, I was in the library at about 10:10. I left when I heard someone say 'QUICK SOMETHING HAS HAPPENED'" he confessed to me.

"Huh? Really?" I asked.

"Yeah! I ran out to see who it was but I didn't find anybody. I continued to search around for who called me, but to no avail. When I was done searching, I saw Billy screaming about a dead body and I joined the group to discover Guillermo's demise." he recalled his story.

"That's really interesting. Thank you" I told him.

"You're welcome."

"So is Gweelok still working on tht computer?" I asked him, seeing Gweelok just sitting there typing away on the computer.

"Yeah, I told him we better investigate but he told me the computer is more important and if he can get whatever he's working on done he'll call a group meeting to tell everyone about it." Ham sighed.

"Yes, I will do that, but on the note of the investigation, I have found something that would be of interest to you." he told me.

Ham and I walked over to him.

"Though this is far from what I'm doing with this thing, I figured out a way to record things on here! I came in before breakfast to turn it on and see if I could catch anything throughout the day. Sure enough, I think I caught something." he told us as he hit a button on the computer keyboard.

A recording began to play. Gweelok muttered as he skipped through some parts that were silent. He then got to a part that had audio. _"SOMETHING HAS HAPPENED!"_  
_"hMM?"_

The sound of footsteps were heard running out of the library. There were a few more seconds of silence before laughing was heard. _"UHUHUHUHUHUHUHUH"_  
_"Ssshhh. Hmmnnmm?"_  
_"Yeah, go now"_

The sound of quick, light footsteps walking out of the library were heard after the audio. There were a few more minutes of silents that Gweelok skipped through. Then the audio went to when Dingle brought us over to the library to see Festro. Gweelok stopped the recording after that.

"How strange..." I tapped my chin.

"Strange, but useful, correct?" Gweelok asked me.

"Indeed" I told him. "Thank you"

"No problemo! Now back to work on this computer!" Gweelok told me.

After speaking with Gweelok and Ham, I left the library. I made my way back to the pool building and went up to Izzie. "Anymore on Guillermo's death?" I asked her.

"Only new thing I found was that he has been dead for over an hour. It's about 11 am right now, so I think he died at about 10 am." she told me.

"Hmm..." I scratched my head. "This case keeps getting weirder and weirder."

After I said that, a loud chime was heard and the TV turned on.

"It's that time! Report to the hotel courtyard immediately! I hope you gathered as much during this investigation as possible, because you're gonna need it!" Tanezumi giggled excitedly before the TV shut off. Izzie sighed and got up. We all walked off into the courtyard and waited in front of the big Tanezumi statue. Tanezumi was standing there giggling. Once everyone was there, the statue opened up to let us all into the same elevator we went in for the Beary Nice murder case.

Once we were all in, the elevator started to go down. There was depressing silence all around just like the first time we went down the elevator, only this time there was more space and room to move around.

Once the elevator opened up, I gasped. A few people in the group screamed.

"I told you I wanted to do things a bit differently this time!"


	20. Chapter 16

The meeting table was there like it was last time, however, directly next to it was a wrestling arena with 4 large pillars on each corner. At the top of these pillars were shackles and chains connected to a spiked wall. above the arena was Uncle Grandpa, who was tied up again like he was last time. Connected to the wrestling arena was a large cage containing a large green beast inside of it with large tusks. The beast inside the cage let out a large roar as it paced back and forth in its cage.

"What is that thing?!" Susie screeched out the question, hugging onto herself.

"That, my dear Susan, is Gornak!" Tanezumi laughed. "He's going to be fighting you in the death match"

Gasps were heard all around.

"That's right! I told you I was going to do things differently this time around!" she told us. "So let me explain this here meeting and death match!"

She excitedly hopped onto the meeting table and rubbed her tiny rat hands together.

"I am very excited about this! Okay, so how this is going to work is we're going to have the meeting like last time, but instead of me getting super bored in between while you idiots discuss boring things that I already know, I'm going to cut y'all off when I get REALLY bored and randomly select 4 people to go up on those pillars. That's an indication that you'll have to speed your meeting up or else they'll all die and get fed to Gorak. Once the meeting is finished, you're going to pick 4 sorry suckers to battle Gornak. If you pick the murderer within that bunch and Gornak wins, you're all safe from grueling punishment. If you don't pick the murderer within that bunch and Gornak wins, I'll let Gornak snack on everyone except the murderer, who will be able to go home and not attend this amusement park of death and chaos anymore! Stakes are high, choose wisely!" the pink rat cackled after she explained the rules.

"Wait a minute, what happens if the randomly selected people get killed before we finish the meeting?" Eric asked.

"You still have to pick 4 people to face Gornak either way, so instead of losing up to 4 people you'll be losing up to 8 people. More death and chaos for Tanezumi~" she giggled.  
"You're sick!" Billy hissed.

Tanezumi only laughed in response. "I'd get going on that meeting if I were you!"  
"Hey let me out of here! Don't kill my friends please!" Uncle Grandpa shouted and cried from his usual spot. He was flailing about, forcing the rope that suspended him in the air to rock him back and forth.

"Fuck off, gramps!" Tanezumi flipped him off as we all sat down around the meeting table. This time, there were cardboard cut-outs of all the people who preciously died sitting at the table with us. Remo, Beary, Melvin, Frank, and Guillermo were all sitting in certain chairs as cardboard cutouts with a big red slash that read "RIPIP" crossed on their faces.

"Let the meeting begin!" Tanezumi stomped her foot before jumping off the table and sitting on her little throne next to the meeting table.

"Let's spare losing 8 people and just pick the culprit right now, since we already know!" Dennis shouted as he pointed at Steve. "It's Mr. Hyde over there!"

"Still in your ignorant bliss I see" Steve chuckled.

"Stop it! We're not going to get anywhere if we don't discuss how Guillermo died!" Izzie put up her hands to try and silence everyone.

"Well duh! He drowned!" Tiger said. "We already know that!"

"Yeah!" Eric nodded.

"Wait a minute!" I said. "I don't think that's entirely correct!"

"What do you mean?" asked Tiger with an irritated look on her face. "We found him at the bottom of a pool! How did he not drown?"

"Well, you ignoramuses, I studied the crap out of that kid's cold, dead body" Izzie began to explain. "And I noticed that he died before even being thrown into the pool!"

There were a few gasps heard around the meeting table.

"W-What?" Susie's eyes were wide.

"Indeed! I noticed when I briefly looked at his body that his face was inflamed and red." I told everyone.

"Yes, not only that, if you open up his mouth, you'll see that his throat was equally inflamed and red with some lesions and what look like burns." Izzie continued to explain. "So, rather than drowning, Guillermo died of some kind of either allergic reaction or chemical reaction before he was ever dunked into the pool."

Everyone fell silent at the information that had just been given. Pizza Steve smirked.  
"This is making a bit more sense now" he said.

"Let me finish, Pizza Man" Izzie seemed irritated that he bothered to speak. "On top of all of that, I was able to estimate that he had died at about 10 am."

"So, from what you're telling us, the murderer tried to cover up his actual death by throwing him into the pool to make it look like he drowned when really he died from some kind of reaction that caused him to choke to death?" Mr. Gus asked to verify the information.

"Correct. He died from asphyxiation." she told him.

"Alright, so he didn't drown. What's the point?" Festro let out a frustrated sigh.  
"Well the point is, we need to figure out what exactly he has a reaction to. How he died is crucial to figuring out who did it and why." Steve pointed out.

"You would know!" Dennis crossed his arms in frustration.

Steve smirked in response. "I would, you are right. I would know because I have a brain and investigated unlike some of you who sat back and were too pussy to bother investigating the case."

Dennis growled and balled his fists in response.

"Calm down now! Let us focus! There are potentially 8 people's lives on the line here!" Fart tried to get everyone focused.

"Right! Okay so now we know how he died, so what exactly was used to kill him?" Billy asked.

"Maybe food! Maybe he had a food allergy and it was crammed down his throat!" Susie speculated.

"Food doesn't make you vomit blood!" Izzie pointed out.

"How do you know he vomited blood?" Susie asked.

"There's still a bit of blood stain on his shirt. Whoever killed him thought maybe throwing him in the pool would get rid of that evidence, but it didn't work out that way." Izzie told us.

"And you said there was swelling in his throat?" Ramona asked.

"Yes" Izzie nodded.

"I've got it!" Ramona snapped her finger and put out her hand in excitement. "I read all about this during the investigation!"

Everyone turned their attention to Ramona.

"Remember that smell in the boy's changing room, my prince?" she asked him.

"Yes, I told you that was Muriatic Acid, which is a chemical used to balance the pH of pools. I also said breathing it in for long periods of time isn't a good idea." Steve responded.

"Yes! I thought it was strange that the pool chemical would be in the changing room rather than the supply closet. I also thought the blood on the floor in the changing room was strange..." Ramona explained. "So I decided to look up Muriatic Acid and its effects on people"

"Smart girl" Steve grinned.

"Thank you, my prince!" she grinned and giggled before putting her hands together. "When I looked it up, I found something interesting. It said that if Muriatic Acid is ingested, it can cause redness, swelling, burns, and can force you to vomit blood."

Izzie snapped her finger. "Bingo, that's it then! He ingested Muriatic Acid!"

A few gasps were heard around the table.

"Wait a minute, why the fuck would he drink Muriatic Acid?" Festro raised the question.

"Well obviously he ain't gonna drink it himself!" Mr. Gus sighed in frustration.

"Someone made him drink it..." Steve said.

"Wait a minute, but they'd get harmful effects from it too if they handled that muriatic acid without any proper equipment!" Ramona pointed out. "Breathing it in for long periods of time can make you really sick! Skin or eye contact could leave fatal burns!"

"I knew you were going to suggest that, and that's why I'm going to reveal to you a key piece of evidence that I found in one of the waste baskets during the investigation..." Steve told us before placing a few things on the table. Those things looked like 2 doctor's masks and 2 pairs of rubber gloves.

"Hmph..." Dennis let out a frustrated sigh. "I-It looks like they were used by 2 people"

"That's right," Steve grinned. "Not only did they protect themselves from any harmful effects the chemical could have done to them, but they were assisted in performing this murder."

More gasps were heard around the table.

"Wait woah woah, we're getting way ahead of ourselves here!" Fart protested a bit, waving his hands back and forth. "Let's take a step back! We now know how Guillermo died and when he died, but do we know who had an alibi for the time of Guillermo's death?"

Everyone began to think about alibis.

"Well, I was in the cafeteria with Tiger, Mary, Izzie, Dennis, and Gweelok" Mr. Gus told us. I nodded along with the other people he listed to verify that alibi.

"That leaves Steve, Slog, Susie, Fart, Festro, Dingle, Eric, Ramona, Ham, and Billy without alibis." Dennis pointed out.

"Wait a minute! The Prince has an alibi! I was speaking to him around 9:45 am!" Ramona told us.

"That must mean you might have been helping him" Festro accused.

"W-What?! No! We were talking we didn't hurt anybody!" Ramona seemed upset at the accusation. "And I even watched him walk back to the hotel after we were done talking, we're innocent!"

"How do you know he went to the hotel? How do you know he didn't sneak off to kill Guillermo?" Festro accused again.

"I saw Steve at the hotel" Slog finally spoke up after being quiet for a while.

"Oh look who decides to speak up!" Festro threw his hands up.

"I-I'm sorry I'll be quiet..." Slog shrunk back.

"No, don't listen to Mr. Manly Man over there, talk to us!" Billy encouraged Slog.

"Well Steve came up to the hotel at around 10 am. I finally decided to come out of my room to get some fresh air and calm down from crying. I saw him about to enter his room, he turned around and began to talk to me about the events that were going on. We were talking for a while, because before I knew it I heard Tanezumi's announcement about the body go off and that's when we both immediately took off to see what was going on." Slog explained.

"I want you to say that again in about 5 seconds" Steve told him before pulling something out of his pocket. He opened the small item in his hand, which turned out to be a mirror. I then understood why he requested that.

Steve lowered his sunglasses and blinked a few times as he looked around the room, a bit confused.

"Uh..."

"Well Steve came up to the hotel at around 10 am..." Slog began to repeat himself.

"Oh yeah, I talked to ol' Sloggers over there around that time!" Steve pushed up his sunglasses and jumped right into the conversation like as if he'd been there the whole time. His tone was different, which is why I knew he wasn't there the whole time.

"Why'd you need a mirror to say that?" Festro asked the question in an accusing tone.  
Steve put his mirror away, ignoring Festro. "I also was talking to Mona at around 9:45 this mornin'. So I couldn't have been the one who killed..." he lowered his sunglasses and looked around at the cardboard cut outs before pushing his sunglasses back up and smirking. "Guillermo!"

"Well that leaves Billy, Fart, Eric, Ham, Susie, Festro, and Dingle without an alibi..." Dennis rubbed his chin in thought.

Tanezumi yawned in the corner. We turned to look at her, and her small paw was circling a big red button.

"Aaahh I'm getting kinda bored..."

_No, anything but that! We're not even finished with the meeting please!_


	21. Chapter 17

"Wait no! Please hang in there Tanezumi!" Slog pleaded.

"You're boring, I want death to happen!" Tanezumi whined.

Slog looked around before snapping his fingers. "If I danced for your amusement would you give us a little bit longer?"

Tanezumi rubbed her chin and thought a bit. "Show me what you got, Nosy McGoo

Slog nodded and hopped up onto the meeting table. He began to do a bunch of different dance moves. Tanezumi seemed to be enjoying herself, because she was laughing and clapping. "Yes! This appeases your Rat Goddess!"

Everyone let out a sigh of relief as Slog kept dancing.  
"Back to alibis" Dennis announced.

"I have an alibi!" Billy said. "I was with Fart! We were trying to discuss ways we could help people not feel on-edge about their secrets being spilled as to prevent murders. Unfortunately, a murder happened before we could set a plan into action."

"I can vouch for that!" Fart giggled, twinkling his eyelashes.

"But that's only 2 people, we don't really know if both of you are telling the truth. There were 2 people who commited this murder!" Eric pointed out.

"Well what about you? Where were you?" Festro pointed, again shooting out accusing questions.

"I was with Susie!" Eric said.

"So you assisted the murder?" Billy accusingly asked.

"What?!" Eric seemed shocked.

"Well, you said you were with Susie, and we just so happened to find a note from Susie in the waste-basket" Billy told Eric. "Isn't that right, Mary?"

I nodded before pulling the note out of my pocket and placing it on the table.  
Everyone gasped, and Susie looked really shocked.

"Oh you didn't think they'd find out you did it, huh?" Festro pointed at Susie.  
"N-No! I didn't write a note!" Susie stammered.

"The note was signed by you, though" I told her, showing her the note. Susie looked over the note and shook her head.

"I didn't write this!" Susie insisted.

"Oh yeah, sure, and my eyes aren't white" Billy laughed sarcastically.

"I'm serious!" Susie whined.

"Why'd you kill him?" Dennis asked.

"I didn't!" Susie screamed.

"Your shirt's green, ain't it! You're the one that knocked me out in the library!" Festro pointed at her.

"It wasn't me!" Susie began to cry.

"Okay I'm bored again!" Tanezumi yawned.

"No wait!" Slog tried dancing harder.

"No I don't care, sit down, blow job king" Tanezumi waved him off.

Slog whimpered and sat back down. As soon as he sat down, Tanezumi pressed the red button she was circling earlier. A loud alarm sound went off as 4 large grabbers shot out of the ceiling. The machine arms grabbed Steve, Ramona, Billy, and Dennis. They all screamed as they were carried up to the pillars. As soon as they were on the pillars, the large metal grabbers dropped them. Once on the pillars, the shackles and chains bound themselves around the 4 victims and a machine whirring noise was heard. Slowly, they were being pulled back toward the wall of spikes.

"BILLY!" Slog screamed as his eyes began to tear up.

They all struggled to get out of the trap, but to no avail.

"HELP!" Ramona screamed.

"The only way you're getting out is if they finish this goddamn meeting!" Tanezumi laughed.

"Well we know who did it anyways, it was Susie and Eric helped her, so let's just put them in there!" Festro suggested hastily. "And since Steve and Ramona are pretty useless we can throw them in too"

"FUCK YOU!" Steve screamed from the pillar as he heard what Festro said.

"You know, I think your library story is bogus, Festro" Gweelok told him.

"What?" Festro looked shocked before getting angry. "You callin' me a liar?"

"I ain't callin' you a truther!" Gweelok pointed at him before turning to me. "Mary, remember that recording I showed you on the computer?" he asked me

"Yes" I nodded.

"Well, I listened to it a few times, and I realized I recognized those 2 voices all too well..." Gweelok said.

Everyone at the table gasped.

"W-What do you mean?" Festro looked a bit nervous.

"Blaggle blegh!" Dingle seemed shocked as well.

"Well, little to anyone's knowledge, I set up a recording system on the computer I had been working on..." Gweelok mentioned. "and I heard some things going on in the library"

"Well then you heard me and Guillermo hiding before I got hit on the head!" Festro insisted.

"No, actually, I heard your voice chuckling, and Dingle's voice shushing you." Gweelok stated.

Everyone gasped, including me.

"That was their voices!" I gasped, recalling the recording I heard and matching it with the voices.

Festro looked around nervously. Dingle, however, got angry.

"Blaggle blaggle blegh!" Dingle yelled out.

"I'm not accusing you of anything, I'm saying Festro's story doesn't add up!" Gweelok pointed out.

"Why are you acting so offended?" Dennis shouted the question from the pillar, struggling to try and get out while slowly going toward the spikes.

"Hurry up!" Billy screamed.

"Yeah man! Don't let Pizza Steve die!" Steve sounded worried.

"Listen, I didn't do nothin! That recording is bogus!" Festro pointed out!

"Blaggle blaggle bleggle bleggg!" Dingle shouted angrily, shaking his fists.

"No that couldn't have been Susie and Eric, they were both deep voices, and I would know your voices anywhere! I lived with you guys for a long time!" Gweelok pointed out.

"HURRY UP!" Billy screamed.

We looked up and saw they were dangerously close to the spikes.

"Alright, alright, we have to decide now!" Fart said.

"We're not done discussing!" I panicked. "What if we pick the wrong people?"

"Look, there's 4 people, and we have an idea of who they might be" Mr. Gus told us. "It would logically have to be either Susie and Eric or Dingle and Festro."

Susie panicked and started crying. "No no no! Please I didn't do anything!"

Eric was also pretty distressed. "Come on now!"

"Well it was pretty strange you found that funnel at the bottom of the pool!" Dennis shouted out from the pillar."

"I object I'm not going in!" Festro hissed.

"Blaggle bleehggh!" Dingle began to cry.

"You're making Dingle cry you assholes!" Festro shouted angrily, pointing at Dingle who was sniffling and sobbing. I kind of felt bad, but what other choice do we have?  
"I'm sorry, but he's right!" I said. Alot of the others agreed.

"Oh, so you've decided then?" Tanezumi asked us excitedly.

"Yes" Mr. Gus sighed.

We heard a loud, high pitched scream. We looked up and saw Steve was right on the spiked wall. "NONONONONO!" Steve shook his head violently, enough for his sunglasses to fall off.

Tanezumi pressed a button and released them from their chains. "Stop whining, Steve-o!" she laughed. Steve fell over and clutched his chest. So did the others on the pillar.  
The big metal grabbers came back to pick them up and bring them back to the meeting table.  
"It's been decided!" Tanezumi laughed.

"No it hasn't!" Festro protested as Dingle and Susie sobbed and Eric looked down in distress.

"Follow me to the arena!" she told them.

None of them budged from their spots. Tanezumi just rolled her eyes and pressed a button on the remote she was holding. The metal grabbers came back and grabbed them. "NOOO!" Susie yelped. The metal grabbers stopped them in front of a table.

"Choose your weapons!" Tanezumi instructed them as they looked around at the table full of weapons. Festro grabbed a battle axe, Dingle grabbed a set of sais, Susie grabbed a spiked bat, and Eric grabbed a large blunt sword. As soon as they chose the weapons, they were immediately pushed into the wrestling ring. A large cage immediately shot out over the arena before the cage containing Gornak opened up. Gornak let out a loud roar as he stomped out. The contenders inside screamed as he charged at them. Dingle, Eric, and Susie ran away, but Festro stood there and swung the battle axe at him. He hit Gornak's shoulder, but that didn't really do anything. Gornak brushed it off like as if he just got a little pin prick and punched Festro into the other side of the arena. Festro hit the cage and fell to the ground. Gornak went at the others, who just kept screaming and running away. Gornak was finally able to grab Susie. Once he grabbed Susie, he lifted her off the ground and dangled her over his mouth. She began to scream and cry. "NO LET ME GO NO!"

"LET GO OF HER!" Eric screamed as he charged at the large beast with the sword.  
Gornak let out a loud roar and knocked Eric against the cage's wall.

Festro charged at Gornak again only to get smacked into the wall yet again.

"That's it..." Eric hissed before getting up. "You messed with the WRONG BROTHA!"

Eric's hoodie began to rip as he flexed his arms.

"Cupcake!" Uncle Grandpa shouted from his usual spot.

Eric continued to grow in muscles and height as he let out an angry battle cry. Everyone stood in amazement as this transformation took place.

"Prepare to get your shit wrecked!" Eric shouted, his voice was deeper than normal.

"There's Eric's secret!" Tanezumi pointed out before immitating him in a mocking way. "ME MAN HULK!"

Gornak threw Susie and let out a loud yell as he charged at the new, muscular Eric. Susie was thrown into Dingle as they tumbled across the arena together. Eric let out a battle cry as he charged at Gornak with his blunt sword. Gornak and Eric were in a pretty heated fight with lots of punching and kicking involved. Festro continued to try and charge at Gornak only to keep getting hit into the wall.

This went on for a long time, what seemed to be like hours almost. Finally, Eric was able to catch Gornak off guard and chop one of his arm's off. Gornak let out a pained cry as his arm was chopped off.

"Take that you son of a bitch!" Eric cried. He then chopped off Gornak's other arm as the beast let out another pained cry. "And some of this, motha fucka!" Eric shouted as he took Festro's battle axe and impaled it right through Gornak's head. Gornak stopped making noise as his eyes became blank. Eric gripped the battle axe before putting his foot on the alien beast's dead corpse and tugging the weapon out. Eric stood there, blood all over him, with the look of a victorious warrior!

Tanezumi clapped. "Now THAT'S what I call entertainment!" She told us before jumping down from her throne.

"But, now the question is... did you pick the right people?" Tanezumi tilted her head. Everyone's faces turned pale.

"I mean, you didn't even finish your meeting, and there's alot of things left unanswered..." Tanezumi tapped her chin and shook her head.

"Stop fucking around, who's the killer?" Dennis made an angry fist.

"Let's consult with the magic 8 balls!" Tanezumi pulled out 2 magic 8 balls before putting them up to her face.

"So, oh great and mighty but not as mighty as me Magic 8 Balls!" she began to shake them.

**_"Who murdered our dearest Guillermo?"_**


	22. Chapter 18

Tanezumi shook the 8 balls vigorously as a large screen came down from behind her. The screen displayed the content inside the Magic 8 Balls. The pictures inside swirled around swiftly for a bit. I felt my heart racing as I watched on. _What if we did choose the wrong people?_

Finally, the Magic 8 Balls stopped spinning and the pictures displayed was the face of Dingle.

Everyone gasped.

"D-Dingle?!" Slog's voice cracked as his eyes teared up.

Dingle began to cry and nodded his head.

"No! You're lying! Tanezumi is lying!" Slog shook his head.

"The Magic 8 Ball never lies, dick lips~" Tanezumi cackled. "Dingle murdered Guillermo! Care to explain how it was done, Dingle?"

"Dingle doesn't even speak English he only speaks Disgustoid!" Festro tried to defend his friend. "You can't do this to a poor, defenseless little boy!"

Dingle finally lifted his head and looked at us with a serious face.

"Shut the FUCK up Festro!" he finally said angrily, his voice was actually alot lighter than the gutteral grunts he usually gave us. "I am NOT defenseless, and I can speak English just fine!"

Everyone gasped, including Festro.

"Dingle?" Fart was shocked.

"Yes! I can speak English just fine! That was one of many of the secrets I tried hiding when I killed Guillermo" he told us.

"You DID kill him?!" Slog was visibly upset.

"Yes! I killed Guillermo. It was me, I did it! And I was SO CLOSE to getting away with it if Gweelok hadn't recorded me and Festro in the library!" he balled up his fists, tears streaming from his eyes.

"But we would have all died!" Gweelok shouted. "You would sacrifice your bros just to keep your secrets?!"

"Yeah, not to mention you didn't even TELL your bros your secrets!" Festro looked offended.

"Well you seemed okay with it, considering you fucking helped me you big purple moron!" Dingle hissed.

More gasps were heard around the room.

"Hey!" Festro got angry, tears forming in his eyes. "I helped you because I didn't want them to tell everyone about your thing! I didn't know you were also trying to hide the fact you can speak English from us!"

Dingle let out a frustrated sigh.

"What thing?" Gweelok asked.

"I can't sa-" Festro began, but Dingle interrupted him.

"I'm just going to lay out everything right now. I had 3 reasons I had to kill Guillermo. First is that I speak fluent English just fine. Second is that I'm not actually biologically a boy-" Dingle began, but Slog interrupted.

"Dingle! It's okay we'd have understood! You didn't have to kill for that!" Slog was crying. "You're fine just the way you a-"

"Shut up! It's not okay! And that leads me to my 3rd and most important reason..." Dingle began again. "This reason is that I wanted to kill off Festro without doing it myself"

Everyone gasped, especially Festro.

"WHAT?! B-But I thought we were best bros!" Festro began to cry.

"That's what you forced onto me!" Dingle sighed. "See, I thought it was going to be like last match, where everyone picks 2 people to go into the death match and duke it out to the death. I set it up in a way so that I could frame Festro into the death match against anybody, hence the fake note I left behind that was supposedly written by Susie."

"I told you I didn't write that note!" Susie slammed her hands on the table.

"I figured you would be at least smart enough to recognize that was Festro's handwriting, as I had Festro write it. Anyways, I was trying to frame Festro and any other person, preferably someone who could kick his ass like Eric, Gus, Tiger, or Steve considering his whacky personality changes and penchant for cannibalism. I was hoping they'd kill off Festro in the death match, so that way I wouldn't have to kill Festro myself, I get a cool prize for laying low, and you all have to do grueling punishment work. However, the death match didn't work that way this time around, so my plan got completely fucked up!" Dingle hissed.

"But what does all that have to do with the 2nd reason, especially if he knew about your gender identity stuff?" Dennis asked.

"Revenge for treating me fucking terribly!" Dingle hissed. "It took him forever to accept my identity! Hell, I don't even think he fully accepts it!"

"I do!" Festro pleaded with him. "I know I did some things, but that was in the past! I'm really sorry about that, bro! I love you! You should know that, man!"

"Liar!" Dingle yelled out as he pointed at him. He began to cry again. "Ever since you purchased me, you forced me to abide by your standards of what a 'true man' is!" Dingle reached onto his head and pulled off the hair piece that was on it, revealing a large bald spot. "Forcing me to shave my head! Forcing me to destroy and burn my books! Forcing me to do grueling work outs with you!" Dingle began to tear up again. "Not only were you forcing your ideals onto me, you also forced me to be your personal slave! Forcing me to lick your feet! Forcing me to act like a dog! Thinking that if I read books or learned anything that I would be too smart to be your bro and I'd join the suffragist movement you called 'crazy cunts who just need dick'!"

Everyone stood silently as they listened to this, especially Festro. Festro just looked down in shame. I looked over at Ramona, who was biting her lip and trying to hold back tears from what she was hearing.

"But you didn't just do this to me, you did this to ALL your 'bros'. You pick on Gweelok just because he's smart and into technology, you constantly fight with Fart and put him down for wanting to get along with the humans and keep things tidy and neat, and you grossly stalk Slog and dump your problems on him and then when he needs you you just throw him away like he's garbage! You treated us all terribly because you're a selfish prick!" Dingle began to cry.

Festro dropped to his knees and held his head.

"I tried so hard to try and make excuses for you. I tried to understand you. I tried to love you like you said you loved me. I realize you're nothing but a liar, a coward, and a douche bag! I hate our society and their disgusting backward system, I hate my parents for being forced to sell me to you because of our warped society, and I hate you for ruining me and everyone else you call your 'bro'!" Dingle turned to Tanezumi. "Now fucking get it over with and kill me already!"

"N-No wait!" Festro's lip quivered as he sobbed the words, holding out his hand. "Dingle..."

"It's too late, Festro" Dingle told him.

Festro slammed his fists onto the ground as he hung his head and began to weep.  
"What have I done?!"

Ramona, Slog, Gweelok, and Fart all began to weep as well. Everyone else were silent and uneasy. Tanezumi laughed. "You're all a bunch of babies!"

"Dingle!" Slog held out his hand. "Even if Festro treated you badly, know that we all love you very much!"

"Yes!" Gweelok bit his lip, tears streaming down his face.

Festro got up and yelled out angrily.

"Don't you kill Dingle!" he screamed at Tanezumi. "Please don't kill him! Kill me instead! I deserve it!"

"Ah don't worry, you're both going to fucking die. You helped him murder Guillermo, accomplices get the same punishment as the killers do!" Tanezumi smiled and turned to us. "Let that be a lesson to you all! You wanna help someone murder someone else, and you get caught, your ass is getting executed too!"

Dingle smiled. "At least that's one good thing out of all this. I'm taking that fucker down with me!"

Festro sighed and nodded his head toward Dingle. "If it set things right, then I am okay with going down..." the purple disgustoid beat on his chest. "I am a man! And I'm going to own up to my mistakes like a man for once!"

"Good!" Tanezumi giggled.

**_"It's execution time"_**


	23. Hooks and Splinters

✖✗✘ ✘✗✖

**_Dingle hung suspended in the middle of the execution room from a chain. His hands and legs were spread out as his head was hanging down. A loud mechanical noise was heard as Dingle looked up to see hooks and chains being thrown at him. Each hook and chain latched onto parts of his skin. Dingle cried out in pain as he continued to get bombarded with a bunch of hooks. After a little bit, his whole body was covered in hooks attached to long metal chains. There was blood all over him as he bit his lip and cried. Soon, the hooks started to retract back to the place they were thrown from, taking a chunk of Dingle's flesh with it as each hook ripped apart his body. Dingle's screams began to fade the more he lost skin and blood. Soon he was just a mass of skeleton and bits of bloody muscle. The hooks deposited Dingle's flesh into a bucket, which was carried through a conveyor belt once it was filled up and deposited into a large plastic box. Tanezumi shut this box and laughed. The label on the box was "Fresh Dingle Berries"._**


	24. Slaughterhouse

✖✗✘ ✘✗✖

**_Festro was deposited onto a large conveyor belt, his arms and legs tied up. He struggled trying to break free as the conveyor belt carried him. He was carried around by different conveyor belts for a while before he came to this conveyor belt that injected him with some kind of drug, sprayed some kind of chemical on him, and then branded his forehead with the word "Swine". A metal grabber came down and picked him up by his foot and began to carry him over to a large pit that had a bunch of sharp-blades in it, the kind you'd see in a meat factory. After being suspended for a little bit, he was dropped into the death-trap. Blood, a few pieces from his organs, and a bone were spewed out of the machine as Festro was getting chopped to pieces. His now chopped and grinded down body was spit into a small meat package labeled "Fresh Man Pork". Tanezumi picked up the package and laughed as she put it next to the "Fresh Dingle Berries" package. She then went over to Steve and offered him the packages, and in response he screeched out and backed away._**


	25. Chapter 19

After the two executions, we all stood there in complete shock and silence. Some people had their mouths open. Others dropped to the floor crying and mourning over our lost friends.

"Dingle! Festro!" Slog sobbed. Billy put a hand on his shoulder in an attempt to comfort him, but knew he couldn't say anything to take away the pain Slog felt. Fart, Gweelok, and Ramona were also on their knees mourning.

"Quit crying, ya bunch of babies!" Tanezumi scolded.

"You killed our friends!" Slog cried.

"They shouldn't have murdered people, then, dick lips!" Tanezumi laughed.

"Shut up! You stupid overgrown rodent!" Billy hissed, balling his hands into fists. "Leave Slog alone! Let go of Uncle Grandpa! Let us out of here!"

"I dare you to hit me, Billy. I'd love to see you die!" she cackled at him.

Billy just let out a frustrated grunt in response. "I won't give you the satisfaction!"

"Aww..." Tanezumi seemed disappointed. "Well, move along now! We're all done with trials. There's no need to stay here!" she motioned for us to go back on the elevator.

We all did so in silence. There were sobs heard amongst the group. The elevator had a considerable amount of space now that 7 of our friends have been killed. Once the elevator traveled up we all piled into the cafeteria to have dinner.

For the most part, dinner was silent. It was a bit more silent with even more tension in the air than the dinner after the last trial. Finally, Steve spoke up. He had that serious tone that he had throughout the investigation.

"You do see now how the buddy system isn't going to work, Gus." he sipped on a cup of tea. That was actually the only thing he had in front of him. No tray of food at all, not even a small dessert plate.

Mr. Gus only sighed in response.

"It doesn't seem like anything is working... we're all going to die" Slog sobbed.

"Not if someone doesn't kill everyone else first" Steve pointed out.

Mr. Gus pounded his fist on the table.

"We can't just give up like this! We have to keep trying!" he had a bit of desperation in his voice.

"Why? Death is inevitable at this point!" Dennis sighed.

"For Uncle Grandpa! For ourselves! For goodness!" Mr. Gus tried to motivate everyone. "We need to stop internalizing the hate and thinking selfishly! We have to work together toward the common goal of getting out of here!"

"Mr. Gus is right!" Fart joined in to defend Mr. Gus. "Killing our friends is something Tanezumi wants us to do! That's not very nice! We can't kill our friends to entertain some evil rat!"

"Yeah! Mr. Gus is right!" a familiar voice said. We all turned around and found it was Uncle Grandpa. His eyes were puffy and red, it looked like he had been crying. "I do NOT want to lose any more of you! Please! I'll even try to help you find a way out of here! I'm trying, just hang in there please! We'll make it all out together!"

"Why did you bring us here in the first place?" Steve asked him.

"I told you! I wanted you all to get along! I didn't know Tanezumi was going to come here and do this! I just wanted you all to get along!" Uncle Grandpa explained again.

Billy sighed. "We will try for you, Uncle Grandpa."

"That's what I like to hear!" Uncle Grandpa smiled, still sniffling a bit. He then disappeared and left us to continue our discussion.

"Well, now that we have that taken care of, there's something I want to ask you, Steve." Mr. Gus directed his attention to Steve, folding his hands together.

"Yes?" Steve asked, taking another sip of his tea.

"Who are you?" he asked.

Steve tilted his head. "What do you mean?"

"It's clear you're not Steve. We know now you have multiple personalities. I'm not trying to call you out, but I'm upset you haven't told me about this earlier. If I'm not talking to Steve, who am I speaking with?" he asked.

Steve gave him a grin. It wasn't his usual "jerk smirk" either. It was a very mysterious grin. I wouldn't call it sinister, but the grin seemed it was withholding many secrets.  
"My name is not important. This body wants to be referred to as 'Steve'. Address my body as Steve. Who I personally am is not important." he replied.

"It is to me." Gus said. "Listen, there's been increasing tension between us over the years and I want it to stop. We need to get along, so does everybody else. We should all understand and know who we all are."

"Problems between us should be discussed only between us, Gus" Steve told him, taking another sip of his tea. "Our identities are not important. Our goal is important. Do not lose focus on the goal."

Mr. Gus sighed. "Alright, we can talk after dinner, then." he looked out at everyone else. "Tomorrow, we'll explore the new part of the amusement park and make sure to look for a way out!

The rest of dinner was silent. After we ate, we began toward our rooms to go to sleep. It was early, but the executions that took place took away our morale. I was about to get into my room, but then I heard Mr. Gus's voice talking to someone. I was a bit curious, so I decided to eavesdrop.

"What's wrong with you, Steve? Why do you lie? Why do you keep secrets from me? Why do you create tension between us? I know we've been hard on each other, but you're my friend. We're friends, Steve, but you treat me like I'm your enemy most of the time." Mr. Gus rattled off the questions. He seemed quite upset.

"There's nothing wrong with me or Steve. I never lie. You should ask Steve that question." Steve replied.

"Which one? I don't know who you are anymore, Steve." Mr. Gus sighed.

"It's better that way." Steve told him.

"Do you really hate me that much?" Mr. Gus asked him.

Steve was silent for a few moments.

"Well?" Gus demanded and answer.

"You tried to kill us." Pizza Steve's voice dropped down to a very serious, grave tone.

Chills went down my spine. _Mr. Gus tried to kill Pizza Steve? When? How? Why?_ I continue to listen in, hoping for an explanation.

"I apologized one hundred times! I know what I did was wrong. I took a prank too far. I should have never done that to you! I beat myself up every day ever since that incident. Can't we move forward?" he pleaded.

"Our main body could have died. We already suffer enough danger and threat." Steve hissed.  
"Is there anything I can do to make it up to you? Please, I-" Mr. Gus started, but Steve cut him off.

"Not to mention you wrote something on our back that had a huge psychological effect on Steve." Steve reminded him.

"Oh come on! 'Ignore me'? You wrote 'Kick Me' on my back!" Gus sounded frustrated.

"Gus, your actions were deemed unforgivable by us. We all agreed to never forgive you. You are a threat to our well being and as the guardian of this body I try to keep you at a safe distance. I only wish to be strictly business with you, Gus. As for the others, I'm not sure how they feel. Steve certainly wants to see you suffer. Sometimes I have to keep him in check." Steve explained to him.

"Can I talk to Steve?" Mr. Gus asked.

"I can bring him out for you but I don't think he'll talk to you the way I am talking to you right now." Pizza Steve warned him.

"Please?" Mr. Gus asked again.

I heard silence on Steve's end. A minute later I heard Steve say "huh? what? where?"  
"Steve? Is that you?" Mr. Gus asked.

"That's my name, don't wear it out!" Steve's tone returned to his usual arrogant self's tone.

"Steve! Let's have a heart to heart talk, you and me. Your other personality said you and your other personalities were still upset about that incident a-" Gus was interrupted by Steve.

"What, when you tried to kill me? You think I forgot? Then you had the audacity to put an ignore me sign on my back? Who the fuck do you think you are?" Steve hissed the questions at him.

"Steve that was a long time ago, I want to move past it and make things better between us" he told him.

"No. It's not going to happen. You've been a threat to us since day one. You crossed the line that day. I want nothing more than for you to go through what I go through." Steve told him, his tone a bit condescending.

"Steve!" Mr. Gus sounded angry. "What the hell do you go through? How the hell am I supposed to know when you lie all the fucking time?"

"I don't lie!" Steve yelled back at him.

"Yes you do! You lie about everything! You have a problem! Maybe it's because you don't remember what you say? I don't know, but you lie to me, others, and yourself." Mr. Gus told him with a stern voice.

"I do not lie! Pizza Steve is a wonderful, talented, and cool guy! You always try to tell him he's not but he is! We deal with so much already, we don't need you funkin' us down!" Steve stomped his foot, his voice clearly has anger in it.

"What do you possibly deal with and go through?" Mr. Gus asked with skepticism. "Because I sure as hell do not see what you are going through!"

"You can't always see what people go through, Gus!" Steve pointed that out to him in a frustrated voice. "You can't always see how bad someone suffers unless you are in their head. Unless you can feel and experience their pain you will never understand or 'see' what someone is going through! And I am under no obligation to tell you about Pizza Steve's experiences. All you need to know is that if you lived a DAY in my mind, you wouldn't survive a goddamn chance. You couldn't even last the whole damn day!"

"Under no obligation? How the hell am I supposed to attempt to understand if you don't tell me, Steve? Explain that to me!" Gus was getting really angry.

"You don't know what it's like to live with Them!" Steve's voice began to trail off. He sounded really upset.

"Who? The other personalities?" Gus asked.

"No. The personalities are fine. I'm talking about Them." Steve brought his voice down to a whisper.

"Who's Them?" Mr. Gus asked.

"I've already said too much. I'm not going to risk my safety for you!" Pizza Steve said before storming away. He opened the door to Gus's room. I jumped back with a startled yelp as he did, considering I was right by the door. Steve lifted his sunglasses to look at me for a moment before shutting the door.

"How long have you been listening in?" he asked me.

"I-I-I-" I couldn't speak. I was so afraid and my heart was beating at a very fast pace. I clutched my chest trying to catch my breath.

"I asked you a goddamn question!" he demanded.

I let out a yelp. "I-I-I don't k-k-know!" I squeaked. I felt so pathetic laying there on the ground in front of Steve.

"What do you mean you don't know? You heard about what me and Gus were talking about didn't you?" he asked.

"I-" I was interrupted.

"Did you hear about Them?" he asked.

I nodded.

He sighed in response. "Don't ever bring it up, you hear? The less I talk about Them the better!"

He stooped down and grabbed my collar. "Steve's safety is of utmost importance! You hear? You will not discuss that subject with anyone and you will not try to delve deeper into the subject!"

I nodded. "Yes! I will not talk about it or even mention it I promise!" I was really afraid. I didn't think Steve would hurt me, but the way he was grabbing my collar was disturbing me. Whoever "They" are, "They" must be a complex mystery about Pizza Steve. Hopefully, "They" will have nothing to do with understanding the amusement park or why Tanezumi is doing what she's doing.

"Good!" he let go of my collar before offering to help me up. "Pizza Steve apologizes for scaring you."

I grabbed his hand and let him help me up. I dusted myself off before going to the door to my room.

"Good night" Steve told me.

"Good night" I told him as I went into my room.

What a crazy day! I tried to get Steve and Gus's conversation out of my mind, but I couldn't stop thinking about it. Who exactly are "They". Why does Steve fear "Them"? Why are "They" a threat to him? Why is Gus a threat to him? I want to know more, but Steve might do something drastic if I try to press the issue. I decided to push it out of my mind the best I could. I could only hope whatever issues Steve is going through that he can overcome them. I laid down in my bed, and a few minutes later I fell asleep. Tomorrow would bring new challenges.


	26. Intermission 4

*a click of a recording device is sounded*

▽: *knock knock*

X: *sound of door opening* Yes?

▽: Hey, can I come in for a minute?

X: Sure thing, My Prince! *sound of feet shuffling and door closing*

▽: I have a favor I want to ask you

X: What is it, My Prince?

▽: Well, it's been bothering me that the others won't tell me what's going on. It's kind of irritating because it is my head and I'd like to know what's going on inside of it. I keep hearing talk about a room being empty, and I'm not really sure what that means. I tried to ask what was going on but the guys keep telling me they aren't allowed to tell me. I'm getting worried! Will you help me? They'll probably listen to you over me and talk to you.

X: I would love to help My Prince, but I am not sure how I am going to help.

▽: I need you to sleep next to me

X: But, My Prince, isn't that inappropriate?

▽: Yo, I asked you to sleep NEXT to me not sleep WITH me. There's a difference, babe. If you want, I'll even sleep on the floor so you know I'm not gonna try anything funny

X: But My Prince! You are a Prince! Princes do not belong on the floor! You may sleep on the bed. I will sleep on the floor!

▽: You aren't sleeping on the floor. Why don't we just both stay on the bed and just trust me when I say I won't try any funny business, okay?

X: Yes, My Prince. Please, make yourself comfortable.

* * *

❀ ✿ **TANEZUMI'S TALK SHOW ✿ ❀**

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ～『✧~*_So I once had a guy tell me my skirt was too short. I ignored him though. If you ignore an idiot for long enough, they'll go away, right? WRONG! That mother fucker followed me and kept telling me how short my skirt was and asking me if he wanted to go back to his place. I'm a fucking rat, mind you. What the fuck did this delusional fuck want from me? I mean, grant it, I'm the most beautiful thing to grace this earth, but c'mon now. I'm not into sick dudes who are into beastiality. So you know what I did? I broke off a loose pipe from a nearby building and cracked him in the fucking mouth with it. I continued to beat the ever loving shit out of that motherfucker. By the time I was done with that motherfucker he was spewing blood from his fat lips and there were giant black and blue bruises all over his corpulent corpse. Fuck men. Let them all burn._ ~(⊙ω⊙✿)』


	27. Chapter 20

The next morning I woke up to Tanezumi's usual morning announcement, got dressed, and brushed my teeth as usual. I couldn't help but think about the trials, the executions, and the conversation between Mr. Gus and Pizza Steve last night. It all really bummed me out, and gave me more questions about this place than answers. After I was ready, I headed out to the cafeteria to meet up with everyone for breakfast.

Everyone began to pile in for breakfast and sat around the table for role call before we were able to get up and get food. Fart was checking off his list as he made sure everyone was present. Suddenly he let out a gasp. "Where's Gweelok? Gweelok?" Fart looked around.  
Everyone began to panic, frantically looking around for Gweelok.

"Not again!" Gus slapped his hands against his head. "Everyone, search out for Gweelok!" he instructed us. Everyone ran out quickly to go search for Gweelok.

I was worried, but I figured if he were to be anywhere he'd be in the library. Ever since we found it, he's been on that computer non-stop.

I ran over to the library, and sure enough he was there. He was alive too, which was a relief. He sat there typing away on that computer.

"He's in the library!" I called outside to anyone who might be able to hear. Soon, people were piling into the library to see Gweelok. They were all relieved to see him still alive.

"Gweelok! There you are! We thought something happened to you!" Fart put a hand on Gweelok's shoulder.

Gweelok shushed him in response and continued to type. "I'm almost done! Please give me more time!"

"I think you've been on that computer long enough..." Fart tried to scold him. Gweelok slapped his hand in response. "NO! This is important! You will thank me later, please give me more time. I will join breakfast when I am done which will be soon!"  
v  
"Alright, c'mon everyone! Back to the cafeteria." Gus instructed. We all went back and got our food. We mostly ate in silence, with Eric, Slog, or Tiger trying their best every so often to strike up a conversation amongst the group. Their efforts failed as we would allgo back to complete silence.

We were half way through our meal when suddenly Gweelok burst in.

"I HAVE DONE IT!" he told us. He happily pranced over to the table. "After numerous hours of hard work, I have finally done it!"

"You're finished with your computer stuff?" Ham asked, a twinkle in his eye.  
"Affirmative!" Gweelok nodded.

"So, what was that computer stuff all about?" Fart asked him.

"Well, I snuck away to work on it some more last night, the death of our friends really motivating me to get this done. I was accidentally locked into the library, as I missed the night time announcement. It didn't matter much to me, I was far too busy to care. I worked all through the night and finally finished now!" he explained to us. "I may be able to unlock some vital information regarding this place!"

"Vital information?" Pizza Steve seemed very interested.

"Affirmative! I have created and installed a program designed to scour the computer network and database for information that could help us figure out why we are here and who Tanezumi might be." Gweelok told us.

"Tanezumi might find out and stop the program though" Fart warned him of the risk.  
"Nah. Uncle Grandpa came to visit me while I was working. He installed a program that's designed to protect it from Tanezumi and her tricks. Hopefully that holds her attempts to thwart us off." Gweelok explained.

"I wanna see the program!" Ham said.

"Sure! After breakfast I'll show you all the program and check up on how they are doing so far." Gweelok told us.

"Well now that you're done working, you should get a good breakfast!" Slog told him. "I bet you're hungry!"

"I am quite famished" Gweelok said before getting up to get himself a plate of breakfast. He quickly scooped food into his mouth to catch up with us. He seemed to be really excited about the computer. I hoped the computer was able to give us some answers we needed to get out of here.

After breakfast, we all followed Gweelok back to the library. He immediately hopped onto the computer and began typing something on the screen. We all gathered around him to look at what he was typing. _Greetings, Problem Solverz_

Suddenly, a very colorful screen popped up before three pixelated characters showed up on the screen. The screen then zoomed in on them so we could see what these characters looked like. One had brown hair in a mohawk with a red sweater on, one looked like a blue and green colored robot, and the last one looked like a giant block-shaped being with a long nose and brown fur all over. The mohawk guy spoke to us. _"Hello, Master User!"_

Gweelok began typing again. _Have you found anything of interest yet?_

The characters on the screen shook their heads. The one with the mohawk spoke again. _"Not yet"_

The robot-looking one started to speak. _"We're going to be doing extensive research on this problem! Don't you worry! This problem should be solved in no time!"_

The brown fur mass began to speak. _"Yeah! This'll be easy!"_

Gweelok nodded and began to type again. _Please be careful and good luck!_

They all nodded and spoke in unison. _"Thank you, Master User!"_

Gweelok clicked the snooze button and turned to us. "Pretty cool, huh?"

I heard a bunch of people say "yeah". I nodded. It was pretty cool how the program was in the form of characters. I hope they are able to find information. As soon as we were done looking at Gweelok's work, Mr. Gus got everyone's attention before speaking.

"Alright, now it's time for us to explore the new part of the amusement park!" he told us. We all nodded before following him to the new part that has been opened up. We didn't seem to be using the buddy system anymore, so we all just went on to explore whatever we wanted. I looked around at the new buildings. One had a a picture of a hand holding a bunch of 100 dollar bills, another had a picture of what looked like a planet on it, another had what looked like a beaker on it, another had a picture of a car on it, and the last one had a picture of Tanezumi on it.

I decided to explore the Tanezumi building first. I went up to the door and tried to open it. The door was locked! I heard cackling behind me as I tried to turn the handle. I spun around and saw Tanezumi standing there. "Do you REALLY think I'm going to let you into my private estates?" she asked.

"Private estates?" I asked her in response.

"Yeah, that's where I stay!" she told me. "That's where I get my beauty sleep and it's also where I film the announcements."

"Why would you put it with the rest of the buildings here? Wouldn't you want to keep it private?" I asked.

"I have it here to taunt you guys. To show you I'm livin' it up better than you are!" she cackled. "Not that you people are really livin' anyways! You're all dropping like flies! Soon, you'll all be dead!"

"We'll see about that!" I told her, narrowing my eyes.

"Yeah we will!" she laughed before disappearing.

The more I stayed here, the more I did not like that rat! She was terribly inhumane and plain evil! It seemed like she didn't care about anyone's personal well being but her own.  
I decided to check out the building next to it, the one with the car on it, considering they were right next to each other. When I went inside, I saw exactly what I was expecting. An auto body shop! There was one singular car and a bunch of car parts scattered all around. The car was quite small and pink. I began to wonder why it was here in the first place. It's not really like you can drive anywhere in this place. Again, Tanezumi popped up. "It looks like you found my car!" she told me.

I jumped at how sudden she came up. I blinked a few times before shaking my head. "Your car?" I asked.

"Yeah! It's broken! Some asshole broke it!" she told me with a hiss.

Just then, Billy and Slog walked in. Slog clapped excitedly. "CARS!"

Tanezumi laughed. "Woah calm down, dick lips! You're acting like you have a field of dick burritos to shove in your mouth" she cackled.

Slog sighed. "Can you stop with that, please? That only defines one part of my life that I'm way over now."

"Yes, please knock it off!" Billy told Tanezumi.

Tanezumi laughed before tapping her chin. "Alright, dick lips, since you were excited about cars, I can only assume you're pretty good with them, no?" she asked him.  
"Yes! I'm an auto-mechanic! Half taught by a family member, half self taught!" he told all of us, proud of himself and his achievement.

"I'm surprised! I thought you were so stupid that the only thing you knew how to do was breathe and inhale erections" she told him, sarcasm in her voice.

Slog sighed. "I know how to do a bunch of other stuff!"

"Oh yeah! That's right! You can wrap your filthy mitts around those slippery meat sausages too, huh?" she cackled.

"Stop it!" Slog was getting really upset, tears welling up in his eyes. Billy was getting angry. "You better knock it off, Tanezumi!"

Tanezumi regathered herself from laughing. "Alright, Alright, Alriiiiggghhhtt" she did a little dance before pulling out a cowboy hat and putting it on her head.

"I'll tell you what," she began as she took the cowboy hat off her head and placed it back on again immediately after. "I will tell you what!" she repeated the same action before chucking her hat to the side. "If you can fix this car for me, I'll stop referring to Slog as the Blow Job King and lay off the dick jokes."

"Would you do that?" Slog got a twinkle in his eyes as a smile spread across his face.

"Yeah! If you fix it up REAL nice, I'll even give you a mini prize that might serve useful to you!" she told him.

"Alright!" Slog raised his fists to show he was pumped and ready. "I'll fix that car right up for you!"

"Good! Get to it, dick lips!" she laughed before disappearing.

"Slog, do you really want to help Tanezumi?" Billy asked.

"She said she'll stop calling me names and give me a prize!" he told Billy as he looked around the room for supplies to fix the car.

"She has a tendency to lie!" Billy reminded Slog.

"Well, if she is lying, at least everyone will see that I am competent at something!" Slog told him, gathering the supplies he needed to fix the car. "You go ahead and explore the rest of the new section, I'm gonna work on this car! I want to show that I am helpful and useful!"

"You already are helpful and useful!" Billy told him. "But, if you wish to work on the car, I will let you do so. I'll check back on you later. Be careful!" With that, Billy left. I left too, wanting to explore another building. I decided to go in the one marked with the beaker this time. As I opened the door, I was not prepared for what happened next. I let out a loud yelp as a large crash was heard.


	28. Chapter 21

Izzie was on the ground, a tray in front of her and a broken glass following after it. Some of the pieces rolled to other parts of the room. I let out a scream. _Someone killed Izzie!_

Izzie then let out a loud frustrated grunt before angrily getting up. I sighed in relief for a brief moment, happy she was okay. However, I quickly became upset once she started to yell at me.

"Watch where you're fucking going!" she shrieked angrily at me.

I whimpered and shrunk back. "I-I'm sorry!" I squeaked out.

"You better be!" she told me with an intimidating tone in her voice. "That could have been hydrochloric acid spilling all over my face! You're lucky it was just an empty beaker!"

"I'll get the broom!" I heard Fart call out. I looked over and saw him prance into the other room.

Izzie sighed and went to the back of the room. I got up and brushed myself off. Carefully, I stepped around the broken glass. Fart came back with a broom and immediately started to clean the mess up.

I finally started to look around, realizing the building with the beaker was a chemistry lab. There were dozens of different bottles containing a variety of chemicals in the cabinets lined up amongst the wall. I saw Izzie in the back of the room gathering some supplies from the lab.

"What are you doing?" I asked Izzie. I wasn't trying to sound like an investigator, but unfortunately she took my small talk as some kind of an attack.

"What's it to ya?" she asked me with a hiss.

"I-I was just wondering! I'm sorry!" I sighed and held my arm. We were doing okay when we first came to the amusement park, but now she seemed a bit different. I didn't understand. Was it all the murders that changed her attitude toward me?

She didn't reply back to me. She simply took her stuff and marched out of the building. The more time she spent at the amusement park, the more bitter she got. I decided it was useless trying to talk to her at this point, so I decided to continue exploring.

I left the chemistry lab and went to the building marked with a hand holding money. When I walked in, I was immediately hit with flashing neon signs and dinging noises. I blinked a few times before fully taking in what was around me. The building I had walked into seemed to be a casino. However, there was something strange about this casino. I looked at every machine, and it seems as though every machine had a picture of Tanezumi on it. However, that picture of Tanezumi seemed to be in place to cover up another picture on the machine. Just then, Uncle Grandpa popped up.

"Hey! What happened to the Uncle Grandpa Luck Machines?" he asked. Tanezumi popped up next to him.

"Luck, Schmuck! Tanezumi's new line is much better!" she told him.

"Is it?" Uncle Grandpa seemed skeptical.

"Of course! Try it out!" she offered one of the machines for him to try.  
Uncle Grandpa sat down and pulled the lever. The pictures on the screen whirled around fast before stopping. The pictures that stopped spelled out "unnecessary surgery". Uncle Grandpa let out a loud cheer.

"Unnecessary Surgery? I WIN!" he clapped and jumped up and down. Tanezumi went right up to him, wearing a surgeon outfit, and took his arm off. Uncle Grandpa only laughed in response. I let out a loud gasp, prepared to see blood. However, Uncle Grandpa literally grew another arm back like it was nothing. I had completely forgotten that Uncle Grandpa was a magical being. I shook my head at their antics. Just as I was about to ignore them and go explore, Tanezumi took the arm she took off of Uncle Grandpa and began to beat him with it.

"GET OUT OF MY CASINO!" she screamed. Uncle Grandpa was yelling out and crying.  
"I'm sorry!" he yelped out.

They seemed to disappear to another end of the building. I looked over at the slot machine Uncle Grandpa was playing on and he had apparently rolled the pictures "Banish Uncle Grandpa". I felt bad for Uncle Grandpa, but there was nothing I could do to stop Tanezumi. I began to explore more of the casino.

I saw Tiger, Ham, and Gweelok inspecting some of the machines. As I approached the middle of the room, I saw Susie inspecting the floor tiles.

"Are you alright, Susie?" I asked her.

She looked up in surprise. "Oh uh... y-yeah!" she blushed. "I was just admiring the floor work in here. It's beautiful!"

I looked at the tiles, and she was right. The color scheme was fuchsia, deep purple, navy, and black, and each tile formed a specific pattern. It was quite brilliant. Whoever designed the tiles did a wonderful job.

I went over to the back of the building and saw Steve standing in front of a large stand alone machine. As I approached, I began to see this stand alone machine was quite different than all the Tanezumi machines. This had triangular pictures that were blacked out with a permanent marker. I stood there with Steve for a moment, just observing it. I had a bad vibe about this particular machine. I jumped a bit when Steve suddenly began to sniff the air. He immediately looked over at me.

"Do you smell that?" he asked me.

"What?" I asked, trying to smell the air.

Steve paced back and forth, tugging on his hair. He then stopped and shook his head. "No no no this isn't happening! I worked so hard!" he put his face into his palms.

"Are you alright?" I asked.

"They're here!" he told me frantically. "They're here!"

"Who?" I asked.

He didn't seem to acknowledge my question as he kept on repeating himself as he tugged on his hair. I finally decided to shake him to get his attention.

"Steve!" I tried to get him to snap back to reality. Instead, he placed his hands on my shoulders firmly.

"I've always hated anchovies." he told me.

"What?" I didn't really understand. Was he finally snapping? I knew he was a strange person and I know he has other personalities, but he's never been like this before.  
Instead of answering me, he pushed me aside and ran out of the building. I tried to process what exactly just happened, but I couldn't really make sense of it. _Why was he talking about anchovies? Who really are they?_ I began to think about the conversation Pizza Steve and Mr. Gus had last night. I decided to just leave and explore the last building. Not only was my meeting with Pizza Steve really strange, but that machine was creeping me out.

I went over to the building with the planet on it and went inside. It seemed to be an auditorium, except the whole place was covered in space and stardust patterns. It was actually really beautiful.

"Wow..." I said to myself as I looked around. I saw Eric, Dennis, and Mr. Gus enjoying the scenery. I also saw Ramona over in the corner reading something. I decided to approach her. I really wanted to understand why Steve was acting strange, and if anyone would know it would be her.

"Hi Ramona" I greeted her.

"Greetings, Mary" she got up and curtseyed.

"Can I ask you something?" I asked her.

"Of course!" she smiled.

"Okay..." I looked around before whispering "What's the matter with Steve?"

Her smile faded. "The Prince? Well..." she sighed. She had a mixture of worry and fear in her face. "I cannot disclose this information with you. However, I will say that he needs our help more than ever and it's crucial we get out of this amusement park"

I nodded. "I understand."

I decided not to bother her anymore about it, so I continued exploring the space auditorium. I found Billy on the stage looking around at the various items around. Billy noticed me and began to speak.

"This room is really fascinating. I can tell Tanezumi hasn't touched this place, because something about its aura is pure and calming." he told me.

"How can you tell?" I asked.

"I can sense certain things you humans can't" he told me.

"Ah" I nodded.

After exploring the room, I had some time to kill before we had to meet back in the cafeteria. When the time came, I made my way down to the cafeteria to discuss our findings. Mr. Gus had everyone gather around.

"So what did everyone find?" he asked.

"An auto-repair shop!" Slog giggled. He had more grease than usual all over him. "I fixed Tanezumi's car and she gave me a present!"

He held up a box she had given him.

"Cool! Let's see what's inside!" Eric said.

Slog looked a bit upset. "I'm sorry, Eric. I can't open the box! Tanezumi told me I couldn't open the box until I was alone in my room!"

"That's an odd request." Billy raised his eyebrow.

"I know!" Slog looked a bit worried.

"Anyways, there's a Chemistry Lab. I took some things I thought that might be useful to the infirmary so we wouldn't have to run back and forth between the different sections of the amusement park." Izzie told us.

"There was a casino!" Ham said.

"There was also a beautiful auditorium filled with stars!" Eric told us.

"Any leads on an exit?" Mr. Gus asked.

Everyone shook their head. Mr. Gus started to look around.

"Hey guys, where's Pizza Steve?" he asked.

Everyone gasped and began to look around the room. Suddenly we heard his voice.  
"He's not here..." we head Pizza Steve's voice say. We all got a bit freaked out after hearing that, frantically looking around for Steve even more. He ended up being under one of the tables.

"He's not here..." Steve had a blank look on his face.

"Who are you?" Mr. Gus asked him. "Please, tell us!"

Steve looked at all of us with a blank stare.

"Who are you?" Mr. Gus repeated his question.

Steve shook his head quickly, finally snapping back to reality.

"Huh, what?" he looked confused.

"Are you okay?" I asked him.

"I-..." he looked around before biting his lip. "I-I'm fine!"

"Well that's good news because I've got a surprise for you!" we whipped around to see Tanezumi standing there with a huge grin on her face.

"I've got a really good incentive for you!"


	29. Chapter 22

Tanezumi jumped up on the table and paced back and forth, a huge grin on her face. "You guys will love this one! Trust me!" she giggled.

"We don't wanna hear it!" Dennis hissed.

"Good thing you don't have to hear this incentive!" she laughed. "All you need to do is play it AND watch it!"

"W-What do you mean?" Susie asked, she began to shrink back into her chair.

"What I mean is, if you go through nice little door I set up in the back of the arcade, I will have a game and a movie waiting for you! Play the game first and watch the movie after for a good incentive AND a little present from me!" she giggled.

"Presents? Like the one you gave me?" Slog asked.

"Kind of, but it's different for everyone!" Tanezumi smiled.

"Why are you giving out presents? What's with the generosity all of a sudden?" Billy sounded skeptical.

"I'm a nice lady!" Tanezumi smiled, though that smile seemed to be hiding something sinister. "I'll be waiting for you!"

She then disappeared and left us all confused.

"Presents? Incentives? This doesn't sound right to me!" Fart rubbed his chin.

"Don't trust Tanezumi! She does these kind of things just to try and get you to do what she wants!" Mr. Gus shook his head. "Look what happened the other times, do not go play that game or watch the movie!"

"Yeah, I'm not really interested in her stupid games." Dennis sighed.

"I am" Izzie giggled.

"Not again!" Dennis huffed.

"I mean, what's so important in that game and movie that we'll want to kill each other? It seems like crap to me." Izzie got up. "I don't know about you, but I'm going to be attending her incentive game for science!"

"Izzie, don't!" Mr. Gus demanded.

"I'm going to! I'll be back!" Izzie left to go see the game.

Mr. Gus sighed. "This is what happened last time!"

Tiger put her hands on his shoulders. "It's okay! Let's just focus on everybody that's here for now."

Mr. Gus nodded. "Alright, so there's no way out of here yet and we discussed everything in the new part of the amusement park, so let's just kick back for now. I will continue to look for a way out if anyone would like to join me."

Everyone nodded and went their separate ways. Nothing too significant happened after that. I had time to hang around until dinner.

Before I made my way to the cafeteria to meet everyone for dinner, I was stopped by Izzie. Her face was paler than usual and her eyes were wide.

"Mary..." she whispered as she put a hand on my shoulder.

"Izzie? Are you okay?" I was really concerned.

"I went in thinking that game was going to be complete bogus, but it left me so uneasy!" she told me.

"What? What happened?" I wanted to know what she saw.

"I can't explain it. Playing the game was really strange. Watching the movie was even worse! The worst part is, none of it made sense, it just gave me a very bad vibe and feeling of dread." she confessed to me.

"What did you see?" I asked her.

"I miss Franky... I feel so bad for him..." she began to tear up. "I wish I came in earlier, so I could have stopped him from murdering Beary. He wouldn't have had to die! He didn't deserve it!"

"Izzie... I'm so sorry..." I was confused. _Why was she bringing up Frank now?_

"I could have saved him, Mary! I failed!" she sobbed. "I failed! It's all my fault!"

"It's not your fault, Izzie. He killed Beary..." I tried to comfort her.

"I could have stopped it! But I was too busy checking this horrible place out!" Izzie hissed.

"Izzie..." I put my arm around her to try and comfort her. She cried into my shoulder.  
"I'm such a fool, Mary!" Izzie cried, her voice was muffled from being buried in my shoulder.

"You're not a fool, Izzie. Sometimes things happen to people that don't deserve it, and it is very unfortunate but there's nothing that can be done." I tried to reassure her. I don't understand why she felt Frank's death was her fault.

She then got up and looked at me. Her eyes were red and filled with tears. "Mary... thank you..." she hugged me. "Thank you for being here for me even when I was a bitch to you! You're a good friend!"

"Anytime, Izzie" I pat her back. She was still crying, but I could tell she was starting to feel a little better. She then let out a little giggle. "Frank gets hurt alot. I would have loved to see the look on his face when I healed up his injuries!" she smiled. "He would have been so happy with someone taking care of him for once!"

"He would have been really appreciative of your help. If he can see you now, he'd probably be really appreciative of your ability to help and heal people's injuries." I told her.

She smiled. "You're right!" she laughed. "If Tanezumi was giving an incentive, she gave me an incentive to continue practicing my skills in the medical field and helping others become healthy, not an incentive to kill anyone!"

I smiled. "That's what I like to hear!" I giggled after I said it, realizing that sentence sounded like something Uncle Grandpa would say.

She hugged me again. "Thank you, Mary!" She then ran off to go meet everyone in the cafeteria.

I followed after her and met everyone in the cafeteria. We all got our food and sat down.  
"So, Izzie, what was in the game?" Mr. Gus asked Izzie.

"Eh..." she picked at her food. "I wouldn't recommend going alone. I had a nice talk with Mary after I played the game and watched the movie and it helped me realize how much I want to help people and how much I want to go into the medical field. However, my experience may be different than someone else's. So if you're going to go, do not go alone or have someone to talk to immediately after you've finished the game and the movie. Going alone with no one to talk to about it can make you feel awful."

Mr. Gus nodded. "Well, that is good that your desire to help others has been reinforced! However, if any of you are planning to watch that movie or play that game, be careful!"  
Everyone nodded in agreement and continued to eat their food. Nothing important happened after that. Just side conversations and enjoying Tiny Miracle's delicious food. After dinner we continued to enjoy the amusement park, nothing too special or important. Time went by an soon Tanezumi's night time announcement sounded.

We made our way to the hotel to prepare for bed. I was just about to enter my room before I was stopped by Steve.

"Mary... I have a favor to ask you..." he rubbed his arm as he spoke.

"What's up?" I asked him.

"I... uh..." he rubbed his head before clearing his throat and standing straight.  
"I extend a very exclusive invitation to you to join me in the viewing of Tanezumi's incentive" he told me, inspecting his fingernails. He was trying to act cool and seem confident, but I could tell he was nervous.

"Why?" I asked.

"You don't question Pizza Steve" he told me, crossing his arms.

"I don't understand why you want to view the movie or play the game." I told him honestly.

"Does it matter?" he asked.

"Well, a little. Why are you asking me?" I asked again. "You could ask Ramona or Gus. You're closer to them. But you're asking me."

"Ramona or Gus won't go! I already extended this invitation to Ramona, but she told me she was afraid. Gus I know will try to convince me not to go. Billy and Tiger would tell me I shouldn't worry about it..." he sighed and took his sunglasses off before looking at me. His usual 'I'm too cool for you' attitude dropped. "I-I don't know who else to ask..."

I could see a look of desperation in his face. "I mean... I could go all by myself, but I remember what Izzie said about the movie and game. It'd be nice to have a second opinion, considering all of the events that are happening."

"Steve..." I began to speak, but he interrupted me by putting his hands on my shoulders.  
"Please?" he asked, his eyes twinkling like a sad puppy dog. It was a bit pathetic to see Pizza Steve look at me like that.

"Alright..." I sighed.

"Thank you!" he looked relieved.

We walked together to the arcade. He seemed to walk on with confidence, but I knew he was afraid. After a moment of silence between us, I finally decided to ask him about earlier today with the machine and being under the table.

"I don't know how I got under the table" he told me honestly. "As for the machine, it's complicated. Even if I wanted to tell you, you probably wouldn't understand."  
"I could always try to understand" I told him.

He shook his head. "I can't say much right now, but I will keep your willingness to understand in mind."

Soon we reached the arcade, and much to my surprise it was open despite it being past the time it's supposed to be open. We walked inside and went straight for the back. There was the door Tanezumi was talking about. It had always been there, but I thought it was a closet. Steve opened the door and we both walked in. There stood a television with what looked like an old Nintendo system hooked up to it.

"Where are you, Tanezumi?" Pizza Steve called out.

Tanezumi immediately responded, appearing right behind us and yelling "BOO!"

We both jumped and turned around, seeing her standing there with that malicious grin of hers.

"Daring children, aren't we?" she laughed. "Coming to check out the incentives after closing hours!"

"Pizza Steve's not afraid!" he told her with confidence.

"We'll see about that, Steve-o!" she laughed. "You won't regret coming out at such a late time!" She then began to rub her chin. "Though, the game is one player. One of yous is going to have to play while the other watches all the way through."

Steve looked at me. "You play" he told me.

"Huh?" Tanezumi scratched her head. "Steve-o, I thought you were the master of video games!"

"I am!" Steve defended himself as if Tanezumi's question was supposed to be an attack. "I-I just think Mary should play. It would be rude of me to always hog the controller!"

"Ha!" Tanezumi laughed. "Alright then! Have fun, kiddies!"

She then handed me the controller before disappearing. Steve and I sat down in the chairs provided in the room, and I pressed start for the game.

The game started out with a cute little teddy bear waving to us. A heart transition screen came on before the title screen came up. The odd thing about the title screen was that there was no title. It was just a big heart in front of a cutesy looking forest. The sun, the clouds, the trees, and the flowers had smiley faces on them and everything was brightly colored. I also noticed everything was pixelated like an old Nintendo game. I pressed the start button again and was brought again to another heart transition screen. The same teddy bear that waved at us in the beginning was standing at the start of the stage. I guess I was playing as the teddy bear. I moved him forward before a notification stopped me. The notification said: **_LEVEL 1: Collect the food items [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I pressed the A button and began to make the teddy bear move around again. The music was very soothing as I walked across the level. I collected all the food items I came across. I noticed a pattern with the food, however. The food items were hot dogs and slices of pizza.

"Why hot dogs and pizza?" Steve asked.

"I don't know." I shrugged.

I reached the end of the level and the teddy bear did a celebratory dance to signify I had successfully completed the level.

"This isn't scary at all!" Steve rolled his eyes.

"This doesn't seem right..." I told him honestly.

I pressed the A button to go to the next level, and I immediately regretted it.

_I wasn't prepared for what I was going to see next_


	30. Chapter 23

The next level was far from the cutesy scene I saw in the last level. Instead, it took place in a dark looking city with red and brown color schemes. The teddy bear I was playing as was now a large giant compared to the rest of the city. It's mouth was covered in a bright red colored substance. At first I thought it was blood before I realized it actually looked alot like ketchup. It was still off putting, especially when I remembered Frank's execution. His blood looked alot like ketchup. Like last time, before I could move the character around a notification popped up. **_DESTROY ALL FOOD PEOPLE [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I could hear Steve shifting uncomfortably in his seat. I was even nervous about this. Why did a cutesy game all of a sudden turn so violent? I pressed A and played the level. As I walked through the level, the music was a very grim and dark version of the last level's song. As I walked around, I saw people with food symbols on them running away from my character screaming. Most of them had hot dog symbols over them, but some of them had pizza symbols on them. There it was again, that same hot dog and pizza pattern.

"What the actual fuck?" Pizza Steve finally asked. "Why are there pizza people in there?"  
The game made me stop to bring up another notification. **_Shut up, Steve. You eat your own people. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I was mortified. _The game could hear us? Or was it Tanezumi messing with us?_ Either way it was really scary. Steve freaked out a little. I pressed A to exit out of the notification and continue playing. As I passed the people, my character stomped on them, crushing them into little bright red and red-orange puddles on the ground. After I did this for a while, another notification popped up. **_I'm hungry! Press B to feed me! [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I really didn't want to feed my character, but I realized I couldn't proceed if I didn't. A new bar popped up on the top of the screen that was showing my character's hunger levels. As I moved my character, I pressed B repeatedly. Each time, he would take a handful of food people and just plop them into his mouth. Every time, I would hear a sickening crunch noise as bright red and red-orange liquid squirted out of his mouth. The bright red blood came from the hot dog people and the red-orange blood came from the pizza people. As I did this, my character's hunger meter was filling up. As soon as it reached the maximum, my character stopped to do that celebratory dance it did in the first level. It then moved on to the third level, which was even more sickening than the last level.

This time, my character was standing next to a character sprite that resembled Frank. Frank sprite was tied up like a pinata. A notification popped up. **_Show my friend how fun pinata is by mashing the A button! TENDERIZE THE MEAT [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I pressed A to exit the notification, but I shook my head. "If I'm supposed to hit this innocent guy I don't want to do this!" I said.

"Yeah, man, this is getting creepy!" Steve hugged himself.

The game came up with another notification. **_You have no choice. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I sighed, exited out of the notification, and began to shiver as a pushed A. My character began to beat the Frank sprite with a bat. The Frank sprite screamed in agony and began to cry. I began to tear up too. Seeing him in pain like that for no reason was very upsetting, not to mention it brought back the memories of Frank's execution. My character continued to beat him up, bright red blood coming out of him with every hit. I heard Frank sprite plead for my character to stop a few times, but I knew I had no other choice. After that was done, the game shifted to a new screen with the same heart transition the beginning of the game had. This time, my character and Frank sprite were standing by a tree and an electrical tower. **_Climbing trees is fun! Tell my friend to climb his tree by pressing B. COOK THE MEAT [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I gulped, realizing this was a direct reference to Frank's tree climbing story. I began to cry. Why did Tanezumi bring this up? No wonder Izzie was upset about Frank earlier. Steve let out a disgusted sigh. I knew I had no choice, so I accepted Frank sprite's fate and pressed B. He began to climb up the electrical tower. Instead of reaching the top, however, Frank sprite was carried away by a large bird. The game came up with a notification. **_Now that's what I call a new experience [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I figured this before, but it didn't really hit me until now. _My character was a representation of Beary Nice._ This didn't make sense to me. The game was disturbing, but I'm still unsure of how this is an incentive to kill. I pressed A to continue and the game heart transitioned to another scene. This scene was probably the sickest scene in the game so far. Frank sprite was bare chested and tied up in the middle of a large drawn circle with a strange design in it. Around the circle, there were other strangely drawn designs and symbols. The Beary Nice representation was standing next to the circle with a book. **_Art is BEARY nice! Draw a picture on my friend by pressing B. PREPARE FOR SACRIFICE [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

Gulping and not pressing anything for a moment, I finally continued and pressed B. Beary Nice representation went up to Frank sprite and began to carve the same symbol as the circle into his chest. Frank sprite let out a scream as this was happening. Once it was done another notification popped up. **_Read my friend a story! Press B to read him a story! PERFORM THE SACRIFICE [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I shook my head, really not wanting to do this. My eyes were wet with tears.  
"T-This is d-disturbing!" Steve stammered.

I pressed the corresponding buttons and suddenly I started to hear dark music and random gibberish being spoken by Beary Nice representation. Before Beary could finish, however, a character that looked like Izzie came in and impaled him with a knife. A notification popped up. **_Drat! Izzie saved the day for Frank! But she also broke the rules. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I pressed A and a cut scene came on. The game had went from pixels to a clear HD picture you'd see in newer video games. Izzie representation was tied up in the chemistry lab. The camera zoomed around her before a loud crash was heard. A huge cloud of smoke evelopped her before an alarm started to go off. A flashing sign on the other end of the screen said "VIRUS DETECTED". The smoke was cleared before a group of robotic doctors rushed in and moved the tied up Izzie representation to one of those moving beds you'd find in a hospital. They brought her over to the infirmary, where unnecessary surgery was performed on her. They cut her open and began to sloppily place her organs on a hospital cart. Soon, she was dead. A notification popped up. **_What could have been [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I tensed up. Not only was the semi-realistic scene I watched disturbing and traumatizing for me, but this could have actually happened if Frank didn't kill Beary, or so the game says. This is why Izzie was really upset. She could have saved Frank and kept him alive and sacrificed herself. She knew this and this is why she felt like a failure. I felt terrible for her, but I'm glad she's still alive. I realized how this could be an incentive. This game is here to reinforce the death of Izzie. Get people to kill Izzie. I pressed A and got another notification. **_The End_**

At the end screen were symbols. It looked like a piece of pizza with 3 hearts next to it and 4 X's next to that. next to the last X and the piece of pizza were the same symbol that was drawn onto Frank's chest.

"That was the game and the movie?" Pizza Steve asked about to get up.

"No sit down! That's what the weenies who come in the morning get! You guys get a special bonus for coming extra late!" Tanezumi told us. "Press A, Mary." She then disappeared.

I nodded and pressed A, though I don't think I wanted to see anymore. A new game popped up. The title was "MAKING PIZZA". This game was in the same HD semi-realistic clarity as Izzie representation's execution was. I pressed the start button to start it.

"This is about me, isn't it?" Pizza Steve sighed.

The game started out with a petri dish and gloved hands looming over it. The gloves were white. Several notification popped up. **_Let's make a wonderful pizza! [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The gloved hand grabbed a bag of mozzarella cheese. **_Add some cheese! [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The hand began to sprinkle the cheese into the petri dish. **_Add some pepperonis for [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The hand placed a pepperoni onto the petri dish. **_Add some olives, some beef, some mushrooms, some jalapenos, and some clams [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The hand placed one of each ingredient into the petri dish. **_Pop it in the oven to have a perfect pizza boy! [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The hand put the petri dish into an incubator. **_Now we wait! [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The screen went black before popping up again with the same filled up petri dish on the table. This time, there are black gloves on the hands looming over it. Several notifications popped up. **_Let's ruin this pizza! [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The hand grabbed a bag of cheese which seemed to have stink emitting from it. **_Add some moldy cheese [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The hand sprinkled some of the rancid cheese into the petri dish. **_Add some rotten pepperoni meat [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The hand placed a rotten piece of pepperoni into the petri dish. **_Add some pickled olives, some undercooked beef, some fungus, some ghost chili peppers, and some anchovies [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The hand placed one of each ingredient in the petri dish. **_Pop it in the oven to have a disgrace to man kind [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The gloved hand put it in the oven. **_Now we wait! [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The screen faded to black.

The next scene, the hands with white gloves were holding a small baby that resembled Pizza Steve. **_My goodness! Look at this perfect angel! He's the perfect gift! [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The gloved hands put him into a small, comfy looking basket filled with blankets. The small baby giggled and snuggled into the blanket. The gloved hands then brought him over to a door step and rang the door bell. The gloved hands moved away from the baby and went to go watch from a far enough distance so that they couldn't be seen. The door opened and it was a middle-aged couple. They had surprised looks on their faces as they happily lifted up the baby. The man took a note out of the basket. A notification popped up. **_Note: I heard your pleas about wanting to start a family but having alot of difficulty starting one. I decided to help you! I really hope you take good care of him, which I know you will. -Love, Uncle Grandpa [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The new father dropped to his knees and cried happy tears of joy, hugging the basket. The mother was also crying happy tears of joy and hugging the basket. **_Welcome to the Scordato family! [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I heard sniffling next to me. I looked over and saw Steve with his sunglasses off wiping tears from his eyes.

"Mary... that's supposed to be me!" he told me, with a sob.

"Awww! You were such an adorable child!" I told him.

"T-Thank you... but this brings back so many memories!" he told me. "But I had no idea Uncle Grandpa was the one who created me himself... but what I want to know is who those black gloves were! What did he do to me?"

My eyes widened when I remembered the black gloves. I had forgotten about it when I saw baby Steve. Now that I remembered, I was afraid! I pressed A to continue and that's where things went bad.


	31. Chapter 24

It showed a young Steve standing there. He must have been about 8 years old here. He had no sunglasses on and he stared at us with a blank expression. After a minute, the same young Steve was shown standing there, except his hands were up revealing his wrists, which had cuts all over them.

Steve let out a small yelp as he slapped his hands over his mouth. He scooted back in his chair.

On the screen, it showed young Steve walking over to a mirror. He cringed at his reflection. A notification popped up. **_I'm horridly ugly. I have no friends. I'm stupid. I have nothing to live for. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I shakily pressed A to continue. It showed several different suicide attempts from young Steve, but he was slightly older this time. He had to have been about 13 in these clips. One clip showed Steve driving a speed bike off of a cliff. Fortunately, he was saved by a nearby tree he grabbed onto before he could fly completely off the edge. The speed bike went traveling down the cliff as Steve hung onto the tree branch. The teenaged Steve began to cry.

The next scene showed him swimming out into the ocean. It looked like he was trying to find the current. As soon as he found it, he stopped swimming and let it take him away. He let it carry him under a few times before he shook his head and began to scream for help. Luckily, he was close enough for people on the beach to see him. His father jumped into a nearby motorboat and zoomed out to save his son. Once teenaged Steve was pulled onto the boat, he began to cry. "What's wrong with me?" he asked, sobbing and hugging his father.

After that he was on the edge of a stage balcony. He let himself fall right off. Fortunately for him, someone saw him doing this and rushed to save him. They ended up catching him, but they both got a bit injured. Teenaged Steve was shown crying in the hospital.

After that the screen went black before another notification popped up. **_No one double crosses Steve [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

Just then, an image of Steve standing ominously with a machete standing in front of an unknown person on the ground came up. The ground, the machete, and Steve were covered in that same red-orange blood I saw coming out of the pizza people in the other game. Steve looked like he was about 17 in this picture. The screen went black again before another notification popped up. **_Who knew we tasted so good. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The same image of Steve eating someone's arm that we saw before the last trial was shown on the screen. The screen blacked out again. **_I can't let them win... [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I severely hesitated to continue on. I looked over at Steve. He was staring stone faced at the TV. Perhaps he looked stone faced because of his sunglasses.

"Should I continue?" I asked him.

He just gave me a nod in response.

I pressed the button to continue. Instead, another notification popped up. **_You tried so hard to stop me. You tried so hard to stop us. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_****_You can't escape from us. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_****_Clive is far gone. Berzerker is joining us soon. The others will soon follow and there's nothing you can do. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_****_Try to avoid us all you want, but you will realize how truly alone you are, Wayne. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_****_You are alone. You are worthless. You are nothing. We will take away everyone and everything you love. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

Just then, the screen became black. I heard Steve lightly whimpering behind me. I looked over at him and he seemed to have sunken into his chair.

"Are you sure you want me to continue?" I asked him, biting my lip. Tears started to well up in my eyes. Everything I was viewing was so awful and I felt so bad for Steve right now. I could only imgine how he was feeling right now.

He only gave me a nod in response.

I turned back to the screen, looking at the hurtful words on the screen. I started to wonder about a few things. _Who was Wayne? Who was Clive? Who was Berzerker?_ I pressed the button to hopefully find out.

The movie began, starting with a scene with Pizza Steve and how he looked like now standing on a boat. The boat was very far out to sea. The boat traveled for a bit before Steve nodded and disappeared off the screen. Soon he came back with a huge bucket and a large string of what looked like dead fish. He set the bucket down before staring at us at the screen. His face was blank even through the sunglasses he had on. Before the scene continued, the screen went black before flashing the red words "KILL YOURSELF" for a few seconds. The screen went back to the scene with Steve on the boat with the dead fish string. He wrapped the string over himself before taking the bucket and dumping it into the water. The bucket was revealed to have chum in it.

"Oh god no..." Steve squeaked. I looked over at him and he was hugging his knees. "No no no no..."

I looked back at the screen and he was standing on the edge of the boat. The same black screen with the words "KILL YOURSELF" flashing for a few seconds came back. Steve was still standing by the edge. He looked over at us viewers. Suddenly, another person was standing in his place. This person had a black cloak with black, bulky fisherman pants and large black rubber boots. His face was similar in shape to Steve's except he was very pale. He had scraggly black hair and a large black sailor's hat upon his head. It was so large it covered his eyes.

I heard Pizza Steve let out a yelp next to me. I also heard his chair fall over. I looked over at him and he was scooting back quickly and shaking his head. "NO! NONONONONO!"  
A notification popped up on the screen. **_The room is empty. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The dark figure that was standing in Steve's place on the boat disappeared and it was now back to Steve, who finally jumped into the water and let himself sink. It showed him under the water, and he was surrounded by a pack of sharks. He took a knife out of his pocket and slit each of his wrists, letting his orange-red blood flow out into the water. The sharks eventually smelled this and went up to him, each biting him and tearing him apart in the most gruesome way. The screen went black. **_He's here. [PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

I really didn't want to continue, but I knew I had to. I pressed the button to continue and that dark figure stood there on the screen watching us. He had that same smile he gave us when he was on the boat. He began to laugh. He sounded alot like Steve, which was pretty scary. A notification popped up. **_KILL YOURSELF, WAYNE![PRESS A TO CONTINUE]_**

The game didn't wait for me to press anything. The game and the whole TV quickly shut off. We sat there in complete silence for a few moments before I heard Steve start to cry. This is the first time I have ever heard him cry so far while we were here. He sobbed hard, trying to catch his breath. His crying made me feel awful. It was tearing me apart. I began to cry too.

Just then, Tanezumi popped up. "Oh look at you babies! Quit crying!" she laughed at us.

"YOU!" Steve hissed. "WHO ARE YOU?!"

"Tanezumi! Duh!" she laughed.

"How do you know about them?" he asked between sobs.

She ignored his questions. "Congratulations! You guys get an awesome prize now..."  
Steve quickly got up and ran out of the room, not even bothering to retrieve his prize. Tanezumi shook her head.

"He forgot his prize!" she rolled her eyes. "Whatever!" she handed me a prize. "This one is yours!" she then handed me another prize. "This is Steve's. Do not open Steve's prize! Give it directly to him! He can't open it in front of you, he can only open it in the privacy of his own room! Same goes for you, only open your present in your room!"  
I nodded.

"Now go to bed!" she laughed before disappearing. I took a few minutes to collect myself before heading back to the hotel. I cautiously looked around me, feeling uneasy after playing those games and watching those movies. As I went up the stairs to get to my room, I was frantically stopped by Steve.

"Mary! I can't be alone right now! Let me stay with you!" Steve was frantic, still sobbing and tears streaming down his face.

"Steve!" I yelped out in surprise as he clung to my arm.

"Please!" he sounded desperate.

"I'll let you on one condition..." I told him.

"Anything!" he pleaded.

"You have to tell me what exactly it was we just saw! You have to explain everything to me!" I told him.

He swallowed hard and tried to collect himself. He was still sobbing and sniffling.  
"A-Alright! Just don't let me be alone!" he told me.

I nodded and let him into my room. I shut the door and he sat down on one of the chairs.  
"Alright, what do you want to know?" he asked me.

"Who are 'They'?" I asked him.

He sighed. "Before I tell you about them, you need to know a little about me..." he told me. "Are you ready? It's alot of information to take in, and I don't like to repeat myself. Hopefully you will understand. You're willingness to understand might help."

I nodded and gave him my full attention. He took in a deep breath.

"Alright. As you know I have multiple personalities. I have 7 of these personalities. We're all pretty much the same in personality, but each one has unique traits and different quirks that can tell us apart. It's really strange, it's not like some kind of actual multiple personality disorder you'd find in humans or a psychology text book. We share knowledge, but not memories." he began. "Each personality has their own name and title as well. You have Pizza Steve the mega celebrity, Pizza Wayne the prank master, Pizza Pete the pyrotechnic, Pizza Chad the guardian, Pizza Beef Supreme the Mighty the rock star, Pizza Berzerker the viking is the best way I can describe him, and Pizza Clive the sailor. Each one of the personalities has their own room in my mind that controls certain parts of my emotions, memories, knowledge intake, etc. Do you understand so far?"

I nodded. "Okay, so Wayne is one of your personalities. How come they were addressing the threats to him?"

"One thing at a time" he waved my question away. "Now that you know a little about me, you can now understand who They are. 'They', as I call them, are other beings that have taken root inside my head. We didn't know what They were at first, as They started out as black globs in the corner of the rooms in our rooms. Soon, those black globs hatched into little beings. At first, They didn't bother us much, but They quickly became a problem. At the age of 8, They would tell me horrible things every night when I went to sleep. They would tell me that I was worthless and that I should just kill myself. Sometimes when I went to sleep, I would have looked into the rooms and They would have written insults and suicide demands all over the wall. It took a toll on me at such a young age, and that's why you saw in the game I had cuts on my wrist and I would look in the mirror and repeat back what They told me. I was young and I didn't know any better. The other pizzas and I had no idea what else to do, so we just listened. My parents found out and immediately had me checked out by a psychologist. I was diagnosed with chronic depression and given heavy medication to get rid of it. I took the medicine for a while, and it worked. However, for that period of time, I never was able to dream. Not being able to dream meant not being able to meet up with the other pizzas and check on them to make sure they were okay. I didn't think much of it at the time, but when I stopped taking the medication at age 13 that's when I regretted even taking the medicine to begin with." he paused for a moment to take off his sunglasses and wipe tears from his eyes.

He placed the sunglasses on the table next to him before continuing. "When I came back, everything was in shambles! Clive was different. His white and blue sailors outfit was replaced with a black cloak. That guy you saw at the end of the movie? That was Clive. That's what he looks like now. Not only did he look like that, but he smelled horrible! He reeked of fish! Not just any kind of fish, either. It was anchovies! I always hated anchovies! They always disgusted me those nasty, hairy, little fish! The smell made me want to gag. He started to tell me that I was weak and stupid, just like those things were telling me before. We decided to have his room put far away from us so we didn't have to smell him. The other thing that was wrong too was Berzerker. During my absence, he had gone a bit crazy He constantly demanded food, and he would sometimes tell me to kill others when they made me upset or angry."

I widened my eyes. "Does he still tell you that?"

"I'll get to that" he told me, again waving my question away. "Anyways. The other pizzas, especially Chad, kept a close eye on them to make sure they didn't start any trouble. However, they caused all kinds of trouble. The good thing that came out of my absence was the fact those black demon things were gone. I'm not sure where They went, but I was glad not to see them! Then, I became 'depressed' again a week after I stopped taking the medicine, and as you saw in the game I attempted suicide many times. Those were the most significant times I had tried to commit suicide. The strange thing about my suicide attempts, though, is that I didn't even know I was trying until last minute. Once I realized what was happening, I would break out into tears wondering what was going on. I would panic because I had no idea what was going on. My parents brought me to the shrink again, and this time the shrink diagnosed me with not only chronic depression, but histrionic disorder as well. They prescribed me an even stronger medication and sent me on my way. However, I didn't take the medicine like I said I did. I knew what I was suffering from was not chronic depression or whatever other crap they were trying to sell on my parents. I knew it was Them. They were making me like this. I had to get to the bottom of this. The next week of sleep, I would seek out answers. Chad significantly helped me with this process, and soon we found out Clive had been behind the suicide attempts. He'd cause me to blank out during the act. When we asked him why he was doing this, he just told us that he always wanted to die. His voice was a hushed whisper, and it was really creepy! With all the efforts of the other pizzas, we had Clive locked away into a far away part of my mind where he couldn't escape and try to destroy me anymore. We thought the nightmare was over, because ever since then, I did not have any suicide attempt episodes and things were pretty normal. Then, at age 17 I was swindled by a friend who I considered very close to me. I don't remember what happened, but Chad told me when he went to defend me from the results of the swindling, he saw red and the next thing he knew my former best friend was dead in front of us, just like you saw in the game. Chad did his best to cover up the murder so we would not get caught, because the last thing I needed was to be thrown in jail after all this crap had been going on. After that, we spent the next week investigating what was going on in my head. A few days into the investigation, I woke up to a girlfriend I had at the time dead in front of me with her arm cut off. Apparently, I was holding the arm and eating it like some kind of crazy cannibal! I panicked, so Chad took over and hid my tracks again. We finally found out it had been Berzerker who was committing the murders, so all the other pizzas locked him up so he wouldn't cause any harm again. We thought that was the end, but it took a few more people getting killed before Chad realized he had to take his role as the 'Guardian' and make sure Berzerker wouldn't escape. I knew I couldn't stay with my parents in that town anymore, because of all the murders. So I found myself a roommate and left town to go very far away. That roommate was Mr. Gus. Things went back to normal for me, but I knew all of those events took a significant toll on my self esteem. So, while Chad guarded me to keep me safe, I became the Pizza Steve I am today!" he grinned.

"So, to cope with the bad things that happened, you became extremely arrogant and proud?" I asked.

"Yep! They always say if you play the part you'll eventually become the part!" he told me.

"So, if that's the case, how come Mr. Gus is a threat to your safety?" I asked him.

"Because he'd always try to detract me from my acting!" Steve hissed. "He would force me to 'see it like it is' by always 'telling it like it is'. If I wasn't trying to recover from serious mental scars, that would have been okay, but it wasn't okay! The more he gave me his bullshit attitude, the more I began to resent him! I knew I had to keep myself safe, so eventually I began to shut him out and treat him as strictly a business partner whether the other pizzas liked it or not. Chad said that was the best option for my optimal health, and if Chad said it you know I better damn listen! Chad helped me out so much! I owe my life to him!"

"Have I spoken with Chad before?" I asked.

"He's been coming out more frequently now that he's been talking about 'the room is empty' crap. So you probably have..." he shrugged.

"What does that even mean?" I asked him.

"I don't know! Ramona and I tried to figure it out the other night, but I ran into a fiasco! As soon as we arrived, those black demon fuckers made their debut and began to tell me awful things. They also started telling Ramona awful things! Ever since then, Ramona hasn't been talking to me as much!" he sighed.

"Oh..." now I understood why Ramona didn't want to talk much about the subject. "What was the last movie all about?" I asked him.

"That's a recurring dream I had, even when Clive was locked away. In fact, it's part of a series of recurring dreams I had where I would kill myself in various ways. The dreams were so terrifying that I would try to keep myself from sleeping. I'd drink energy drinks, take energy pills, read scary stories, anything! Anything to keep me from falling asleep! When sleepiness finally got to me, the recurring dreams went away for a while and I was back to interacting with the other pizzas. It would be like that. Where one week I'd interact with the pizzas and the next week I'd have recurring nightmares of me killing myself." he sighed.

"Thank you for telling me all of this" I told him. "I now understand!" I tapped my chin. "Though, one thing I don't understand is, why is she after you and where did those other pizzas go if the rooms are empty?" I asked.

"That's where you come in!" he told me. "Ramona was unsuccessful, but you might be able to help! I need you to go into my head!"

"Wait what?" I asked him. "H-How?"

"I have to sleep next to you so our dream realms can merge." he told me.

I gave him a suspicious look. He sighed in response.

"I'm not being a pervert! Ramona gave me that same fucking look! I swear I'm not tryin' anything funny!" he reassured me, putting his hands up. "Please! This means alot to me if you can help me figure out what's going on! I have a feeling this might be significant to what's going on!"

I nodded. "You might be right."

"How else would Tanezumi know so much about me? She must be in cahoots with whoever put 'Them' inside of my head!" he told me.

"Alright, make yourself comfortable I guess." I told him walking over to my bed. "You better not try anything funny, though!"

"I won't! I promise!" he told me, walking to the other side of my bed. "Here, I'll put a few of the extra pillows between us so you know I won't try anything!" he reassured me as he built a pillow wall between my side of the bed and his side of the bed. I nodded and tucked myself into my side of the bed while he tucked himself into his side of the bed.  
"I want to apologize for any crazy shit you may see in my brain" he told me.

I shook my head. "I understand. I think I'm getting used to seeing all this crazy stuff by now."

I shut my eyes and went to sleep, preparing myself for what I was going to see in Pizza Steve's mind.

Of course, as he told me there would be, there I saw crazy stuff and complete chaos.


End file.
